STORRS, Conn. ― UConn women’s basketball star Paige Bueckers was comfortable with the uncomfortable on Saturday.
Bueckers, one of the top players in the 2025 women’s March Madness tournament, had a relatively soft impact on the box score in the No. 2 seed Huskies’ 103-34 first-round domination of No. 15 seed Arkansas State. But that didn’t stop her from making her presence known.
She contributed 11 points, good for fourth among Huskies players, as well as four assists, one rebound, two blocks and two steals in 21 minutes.
For a player of Bueckers’ caliber, that’s a rather pedestrian stat line. But that wasn’t how UConn head coach Geno Auriemma saw it.
“That’s the way you have to play at Connecticut,” Auriemma said after the game. “Some nights it’s about you and some nights it’s not. What did we have, 29 assists on 40 baskets? That’s pretty good.”
After Arkansas State scored the game’s first basket, UConn unleashed a 13-0 run in the opening minutes. The Red Wolves went scoreless for 5:20 before a 3-pointer finally found its way in, but followed it with another drought of 3:41 to end the first quarter. The Huskies were already ahead by 29.
It was more of the same to end the half. Arkansas State committed 16 turnovers that led to 27 of UConn’s 66 first-half points. The Red Wolves shot 6 for 36 from the field in the first two quarters.
Nothing was easy.
It was Azzi Fudd (game-high 27 points) and Sarah Strong (20 points, 12 rebounds) who dominated the stat sheet. Fudd added seven…
