The Connecticut Huskies won their fifth National Championship Monday night, the most of any school in the 21st century and the most without a loss in the title game. UConn men's hoops is less consistent than the women's side, but Geno Auriemma's program has fallen behind in recent years. Dan Hurley's squad ended the longest title drought the school has seen since Rebecca Lobo & co. captured their first crown in 1995:
I haven't lived there in nearly two decades but it is nice to see my home state succeed at something. Indiana, Kentucky, and North Carolina were always known as traditional basketball schools and states. Connecticut was added to that list long ago. They don't have the pro hoops history to match the "blue bloods" but the success on the women's side had a hand in bringing a WNBA team to the state:
I don't have any Connecticut Sun cards. Perhaps I should add one to my very small stack of WNBA cards.
Yep, I have exactly one page of women's basketball cards in my collection. More than half of it is UConn-related, and yet I'm still missing Nykesha Sales, Diana Taurasi, Swin Cash, Maya Moore, Paige Bueckers... you get the idea.
Heck, I haven't kept up with the Husky men either. When I was a kid, my interest in UConn basketball was right up there with the Red Sox. Tate George was my guy. Then it was Chris Smith, then Donyell Marshall, then Ray Allen.
By the time Rip Hamilton and Khalid El-Amin took over, I was devoting a lot less time to basketball and a lot more time to girls... some of whom happened to like basketball.
My high school drama club took a trip to the UConn campus for an acting workshop. (It's the only time I've been up there, btw.) We each got to pick from a list of classes and I completely biffed it. Somehow I ended up in some kind of yoga/mediation-type workshop. Of the 75 or so students in my school that attended this trip there was only one in the class with me.
Danielle was a lifesaver; I would have felt so foolish and awkward without her in that class. When the 90-minute workshop was over, she walked with me to the other end of the campus where we had to meet up with the rest of the group for a performance of Six Degrees of Separation.
During our long stroll across the campus, we chatted (she more than I) until we approached Gampel Pavilion, which she enthusiastically indicated. Her hoops fandom was one reason why she wanted to enroll at the university one day. I have no idea if she did.
Though it was a textbook opportunity to exchange numbers and stay in touch, I was too self-conscious to make the attempt when we parted company at the theater, or on the bus ride back home.
A few weeks later I was getting lunch in the school cafeteria when I ran into my baseball buddy Mike. Mike was a huge fan of Martin Scorsese films, the Yankees, and Gary Sheffield (long before Sheff became a Yankee). His new girlfriend was standing by his side. "Hi, Chris!" She said cheerfully.
"Hey, Danielle." I replied, holding back a heavy sigh.
"You guys know each other?" Mike said, surprised.
Not quite.
Anyway, I moved to New Jersey a few years later and adopted Jersey's Team as my new fave. I was never a college sports fan outside of Connecticut and admittedly only pay attention when the Huskies are in the national championship. Which is fair play since college hoop fans are oblivious about my team. One of the Defector comrades commented thusly:
I'm not paying $79 to fish-slap this guy, so here you go:
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| 1995 - Jacques Lemaire |
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| 2000 - Larry Robinson |
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| 2003 - Pat Burns |
Responses from Defector readers included: Chelsea FC (Really? You had to look across the pond for an example?) and the Washington Redshins' impressive run of three Super Bowl victories with three different... quarterbacks.
Which reminds me - I might have to interrupt the All-Time Teams series again for Devils playoff talk.
Can we get four Stanley Cups with four different coaches?
Back to baseball tomorrow. Thanks for reading!
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Whenever I hear the team name I think it’s Canadian - Yukon Huskies
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised you didn't mention the Red Sox for the 3 Championship/3 coaches/12 years discussion.
ReplyDeleteDon't usually think about UConn... but when you mentioned Ray Allen... it got me thinking about one of my favorite memorabilia cards. I'm 99.9% positive that the first game used memorabilia card I pulled was a Allen jersey card out of 1996 Press Pass Basketball... that features a swatch of his college jersey.
ReplyDeleteSo if she was with Mike, then you could know if she wound up going to UConn, maybe? Or do a Facebook search?
ReplyDeletePeople tend to forget about hockey for some reason. And I'll bet that same person has probably never heard of the Devils
ReplyDelete