BIG EAST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 10, 2025

Geno Auriemma

Azzi Fudd

Sarah Strong

Paige Bueckers

Mohegan Sun Arena

UConn Huskies

Postgame Media Conference

UConn 70, Creighton 50

THE MODERATOR: Joining us from UConn, Head Coach Geno Auriemma, student-athletes Azzi Fudd, Sarah Strong, and Paige Bueckers. We'll start with an opening statement from Coach.

GENO AURIEMMA: The road to these tournaments, I was telling the team, it looks easy because sometimes we have a tendency to make it look easier than it really is. But the amount of work that goes into what we try to do and how we do it, that's kind of the reward that you get is being able to play in this game and win a game like this.

I thought it was appropriate that we played Creighton because they're a terrific team and had a great year up to this point. I just have a lot of admiration for their team, and those seniors on that team have been through a lot and have accomplished a lot and had incredible careers. I'm sure that they're going to get somebody that everybody thinks they're not going to get in the NCAA Tournament. I'm convinced of that.

So congrats to Coach Flan and those kids and the rest of their team.

But our guys were pretty darn good defensively, and we were really, really good offensively when we needed to be. We need a couple of days off right now, and it's going to be fun thinking back on this.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Paige, you accomplished something no other UConn player or any other player team has done being a three-time Big East Most Outstanding Player. What does that mean to you and what does it mean going to the NCAA with your team for the most part being healthy for probably one of the first time in your career?

PAIGE BUECKERS: It's very cool. It's hard to do something that has never been done at UConn before. You feel like everything has been accomplished. I'm grateful. I'm blessed. It's really a team achievement, a team award, a testament to the coaching staff, my teammates who do a whole bunch for me. So I'm able to go out there and perform alongside of them.

I feel like we're heading in the right direction with our momentum heading into the tournament. Obviously we have some time off before tournament play starts. So we want to continue to keep getting better, maximize on the practice days that we'll have to prepare. Keep getting healthy and keep getting better and continue to have more reps of what we need to get better at.

Q. Azzi, what's it like playing with Sarah and Paige, and what makes the three of you guys when you are all clicking so dangerous?

AZZI FUDD: Playing with them is incredibly fun. Playing with people that know how to play basketball and know how to do everything on the court makes it so easy to play with because any look you get is going to be a good one. And they're so selfless as well that if they're not open -- they have so much trust in, not just me, but our whole team, that every shot is a good one, every pass is a good one.

I mean, like I said, they can do everything. It makes it so much fun to play with and so easy to play with as well.

Q. Paige, how would you describe, quote/unquote, post-season Paige? What happens to turn you on to handle the pressure and handle the big situations like you have through five years?

PAIGE BUECKERS: I think just a sense of urgency. Obviously knowing that for this -- it's one loss and you're done. It's the same way for this tournament as it is the next. Your sense of urgency rises, your attention to detail rises.

But you want to lean back on the details and the preparation you've throughout the entire regular season. Obviously everybody wants to play their best in the most important part of the season and to have confidence in that, to have faith in that, continue to practice give it your all, leave nothing out on the floor and play with your heart, play with passion, and have fun, so...

Q. If Paige and Azzi could speak to this one. What's difference about this year's team going into the tournament? Is it a different kind of momentum than you've had in the past, a different kind of cohesion? What do you guys have this year that maybe you haven't had in the past?

PAIGE BUECKERS: I think depth is a huge one. Our ability to play with different line-ups, go big, go small, have people available off the bench that can contribute and do great things for the team. So having different line-ups, meshing together in practice, throwing different people out there with different groups, different line-ups, I think, is something that's been different this season.

Q. (Off microphone.)

AZZI FUDD: I have the same answer. I think depth is huge.

Q. Paige, I feel like the last two games were the most animated we've seen you in a while, cheering, getting in people's faces. Did you deliberately bring that out of yourself this time of year, or does it just come in these big moments?

PAIGE BUECKERS: There's an emphasis on me having fun in the last postseason run. Just enjoying it, just embracing it. I love playing with this team. I love playing at UConn. I love playing in these environments so I wanted to show it more and enjoy it more and not feel the pressure, play with pressure, but just play with joy.

Q. Sarah, your first postseason experience. What were you told? How were you prepared? Did everything live up to what you expected or even better?

SARAH STRONG: It's great to win. I feel like I don't really think about it too much that it's a championship game. I just try to keep my same mentality for every other game.

Q. This is for Paige. I know it's kind of a way, way back part of tonight. It probably wasn't even on your mind. But, A, you are teammates with Mallory and Lauren going way back to the Minnesota days. What was it like playing for a championship with players you go back way back with for your final Big East game?

PAIGE BUECKERS: Yeah, I played with and against a lot of those people on the team, and we have great relationships. Obviously competing tonight for a championship. But just to see where we were, just to see how far we've came, and how we are living out our dreams playing basketball for a Big East championship at an extremely high level. Both teams are ranked. Both teams are great.

So just to see us fulfill and live out our dreams that we talked about since we've been little is really rewarding.

Q. Azzi, Coach has talked almost every year about how difficult it is to play against Creighton because they run such great offense. Yet, you guys shut them down time and time again. Can you talk about the connectivity of your defense and what it is that makes you capable of shutting down a good offense like that?

AZZI FUDD: Yeah. Like Coach said, their offense is super good and well-run. I think that the defense has been a key for us all season. So playing them is always a challenge, but a really good test for us, especially going into the rest of March, to kind of get our defense and our communication and our just chemistry and togetherness locked down tight.

I think that showed tonight. We did a good job. Obviously there are things that we need to clean up and fix, but for the most part, I was really proud of how well we did, our communication on all levels.

Q. Paige, you have now been here for five Big East tournament celebrations. Was this one any different? Did it feel a little more muted or upbeat? Was there a difference compared to the previous four?

PAIGE BUECKERS: I don't really feel a difference. Probably a little bit more bittersweet because I know it's my last time playing here, last time playing in the Big East. So probably just that feeling, but an overwhelming sense of gratitude, joy, and a rewarding feeling.

Q. Azzi, last year you didn't play in the NCAA Tournament. Just tell me about your excitement level of being able to go to the tournament again. And when the Selection Show on Sunday comes up, what will you look for as a basketball fan besides where you are going and who you might be playing?

AZZI FUDD: I mean, even just the Big East tournament, I didn't play in it last year. So being here -- I haven't played here in two years. My goal this year was kind of take nothing for granted, be grateful for every moment I get on the floor. So just being here was so special and getting to win this this year because last year was -- I remember how it feels, and it's not fun not being able to be out there with your teammates.

It's fun to celebrate your teammates, but it's different when you are out on the floor with them. So just this whole weekend has been really, really incredible. So I haven't even really looked forward to next weekend, but I am super excited to see where we land.

I believe in this team so much, so I think that wherever we go, I'm not -- obviously it's exciting to find out, but I'm not worried about where we go and who we're up against. I have so much confidence in this team. I can't wait to keep playing with them.

Q. Sarah, what have you learned from playing with Paige and Azzi? What have you learned so far this season from playing with them?

SARAH STRONG: One thing I learned is that confidence is really important. I feel like both of them carry each other with great confidence, and it's really important to play basketball with.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you for your time. Congratulations. Questions for Coach.

Q. Geno, I know Azzi didn't think much of the question, but I'll ask you. What's different as you go into this tournament? I know obviously you've got Sarah; you didn't have her before. Paige and Azzi playing together; didn't have that before. A little more depth obviously. A lot more depth than you've had before. What gives you confidence that this is a different team going into...

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, well, first off, I hope everybody was able to catch how much information these guys gave you and how fast they were talking. Hopefully you recorded it.

They're the most boring interviewees I have ever been around in my life. You can imagine coaching them because that's basically what I get when I ask them stuff.

You can't underestimate and you alluded to it -- you can't underestimate the change in personnel, right, how much that means. Because last year -- let's take that, for instance, and the year before -- you're going into the NCAA Tournament with your fingers crossed hoping that nothing else happens because you're just so used to one setback after another after another that it almost felt like you're operating on borrowed time. You know, that you are just waiting for that last shoe to fall.

You knew that your margin for error was so slight, so narrow, and it's hard to get players to play at a real high level and not understand we can't foul, we can't turn the ball over, we can't miss shots. We have to do everything perfectly.

This year I think the sense is we can handle more things that are thrown at us. We maybe have answers to some of the things that we didn't have last year. Obviously we don't have the same level of experience that we had last year. You know, we didn't have a Nika, we didn't have an Aaliyah that's played all the basketball that they played.

Azzi hasn't played hardly any basketball. Sarah is a freshman. Jana is a freshman. We don't have quite the experience that some of those guys had. But what we do have is the ability if the game is not going in our direction that we can change it. That's comforting to know. That doesn't mean we're going to change it, but we have the opportunity to change it.

You're always excited for the NCAA Tournament, but some years, you know, you're hoping and praying. This year we still have that. Still have that, but it's not as dire, not as crucial as it was last year.

Q. Geno, 30 conference tournament crowns. Your players weren't around to see all those or know what that really means, but for you what does it take to have that consistency and be to able to reach that threshold?

GENO AURIEMMA: I mean, it's pretty sad that we've won more tournaments for longer than they've all been alive. That's hard to actually even make that statement because I was asked -- as a matter of fact, my daughter after the game, she said, was Megan the first Big East championship -- was she on the first Big East championship team? I said, yes, and she's in the building. Kalana Greene was around last night.

There's generations that can all share in all these conference tournaments that they happened in the '80s and the '90s and 2010s and 2020s. So that consistency, that ability to keep doing that with all the changing players and the changing times and all the other things that are happening.

I think we have obviously really good players. I don't think anybody wins without really good players, and we've been fortunate to get terrific players for 30 years. Otherwise, we wouldn't be talking about this subject.

But at the same time, you know, I think we have a culture. We have a belief system in our program that this is the expectation. I truly believe that the higher you set expectations, the closer you get to achieving those. We have tremendously high expectations every year. Those never go away. Some years you fall short, but most times we don't.

I like the fact that whenever we've had the best team, we win. When we've not had the best team, we don't win. That's not guaranteed to UConn.

Q. Paige has accomplished something tonight that no other player has ever done -- albeit Stewie was in the conference with you guys when she was at the school. To have her be the only player to ever win three Most Outstanding Players in the Big East, what does that mean to her overall legacy? You've said before the standard at the school is very, very high. Is her legacy being defined a little bit in the next six games you guys potentially have?

GENO AURIEMMA: I think Sarah should have got it. I'm just saying that because somebody should write it. She'll hear it and read it, and then I'll have to deal with it, which will be fun.

I think it's funny you mentioned that. Because I always go into this tournament -- if we have the Player of the Year, I always think someone else is going to win it. Because it's happened so many times where someone just rises up and just has an unbelievable tournament. I mean, it's happened to us a lot. Fortunately, we've had those kind of players.

I'm always expecting who is going to be that other person, and that's why I was saying about Sarah. You know, Paige is so good, and she does so many things. But in another time, in another year, the things that Sarah did would be, you know, Most Outstanding Player in the tournament. That's how you win this tournament. You need more contributions from more people.

But Paige is steady. She's consistent, and she plays her best games generally when we need her to play her best games. Yeah, this is quite an achievement by her. It is. This conference has been around a long time. So, yeah, it's quite an accomplishment.

Q. (Off microphone.)

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, in the Big East. Shelly Pennefather, I think, was the first great, great, great super star, and then Kerry Bascom was. There have been others. Paige is certainly going to be on that list of the best players ever in the Big East.

Q. You've been saying that you wanted Sarah to play like she's one of the best players in the country. Did you see her take any steps forward with that this weekend?

GENO AURIEMMA: I thought the third period today, maybe the first five, six minutes of that third period, I thought you saw something you haven't seen yet this year. That's what I was talking about that if we can get that mindset, that feeling, you know, in the next tournament that we play in -- yeah, actually we're going to need that if we want to win the games that I think we need to win. We're going to need Sarah to be exactly like she was this weekend and especially like she was in the third quarter.

I mean, you look at her stat line, right? 13 points, 11 rebounds, 4 assists, 6 steals, and 3 blocks. Who does that? Only the MVP. Don't worry. She's listening. She's listening. Paige is listening.

Q. Paige talking about playing with more joy, having more fun during this run, did you see that from her this weekend? When she has that energy, do you see it spread to everyone else as well?

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah. If you think about it, when -- any time a team was making a run, that's where we look to. We knew that if we put the ball in Paige's hands, something good was going to happen. And the coaches talk about it all the time on the bench that whenever we get a little bit stale on offense, we're going to go to that two-man game with Paige and Sarah, and something is going to click. Something is going to happen.

When she plays free and clear -- there's a lot of pressure on her, there's a lot of demands on her from a lot of different sources. It's a heavy weight to carry around everywhere you go. It can be demoralizing at times. No matter what you do, more is expected from you.

For her to be able to constantly come up with these kind of performances time and time again, she just has that thing that those kinds of players have.

Q. I feel like all season Paige, Sarah, and Azzi have taken turns having great games, whether it was two of them or one of them. But this weekend all three kind of hit their stride in all three games. Do you think their chemistry is at an all-time high in that they're having good games consistently?

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, I do. I believe that all three of them do a lot to help each other. I think probably Azzi is the biggest beneficiary of all, because when you've got to pay so much attention to Paige and Sarah and what they're doing with the ball, people maybe get a little bit sidetracked and they're not quite sure, like, am I supposed to help over here, am I supposed to help guard these two guys? Can I play -- and they make a mistake, and, boom, Azzi has a wide-open three.

So the three of them pretty much do what they're really, really good at. We need them. Azzi didn't score in the second half today. That probably -- the first half she was unbelievably good. Going to the next tournament, we have to find a way to have all three of them be consistently good the entire game. We're going to need that.

There's been a couple of times where all three of them have played great, but we're going to need all three of them to play great every one of those games that we're going to play.

Q. Kaitlyn Chen had five turnovers tonight. From yourself perspective, was it the Creighton defense, or was she pushing it more trying to create?

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, I wasn't too thrilled with our guards. We have been playing games where we had four turnovers, five turnovers, halves with no turnovers. Sometimes, you know, when the games mean as much as they mean today, players get a little bit anxious to do some things, and they get a little bit ahead of themselves, get a little careless. I wasn't too thrilled about that.

Those are things that we can fix for sure. I didn't like the fact that we had 17 turnovers. I do think that Creighton's defense is a little bit underrated because they are a very good defensive team. Their offense gets a lot of notoriety, but they're a very good defensive team. They put a lot of pressure on our guards, you know. Both Kaitlyn and KK were under a lot of pressure the entire game.

Q. I apologize for shifting gears, but what is it about the Creighton prep? What is that like in a tournament setting, in a weekend setting with a short turnaround, and you kind of have to go through things that makes it difficult?

GENO AURIEMMA: Luckily, this is the third time that we've played them, so we didn't have to do a whole lot of anything different than what we've been doing. For a team that's going to play them -- let's say they play Saturday, Monday. Let's say they win Saturday, and now you have one day to prepare for them, Sunday for Monday. This is the same group of kids that went to the final eight and had a chance to go to the Final Four.

So they know how to play if big games. It is hard to prepare for them. They know each other so well. They move without the ball really well. Today they didn't shoot the ball great, but when they've got those things going, I think they can beat any team in the country if they're able.

Again, they're a lot like us in that sense. We've got to make a lot more threes than the other team. So do they. But I know -- believe me, I was hoping Georgetown would win that game. Not no disrespect to Georgetown, but in some ways because I knew it would be a headache to play them. But in the end, you want to play them because it makes it more worthwhile to play that team tonight. Whoever is playing them in the tournament, they're going to have their hands full, for sure.

Q. What is it about your defense that allows you to play a good offensive team like that and shut them down? Is it connectivity? Is it the small line-up?

GENO AURIEMMA: Tonya thinks I hate my defense. Not mine. My team's defense. She thinks I don't have enough respect for our defense because I'm always complaining about what we're not doing.

But what we are doing is the scouting report is being followed. Like Tonya had a great scouting report today, and we were pretty locked in on what we're trying to do, what the game plan is. That's been really -- we play hard, yes. We have a small line-up. We can switch everything, yes. But at the end of the day, if you are not a smart defensive team, teams like that are going to kill you.

I think today, that first half, it was really, really hard for them to get anything done. And it's been like that because I think we're really locked in right now. We're playing really good as a team. Our team defense has been really good.

But, you know, it comes and goes too. You know, keep your fingers crossed.

Q. Geno, do you think Paige, if you look back where she was, say, a year ago having played so many minutes before even playing in the NCAA Tournament -- '22 coming off the knee injury and '21, the bubble -- is she in maybe the best spot she's been in headed to the NCAA Tournament in her career? What do you think?

GENO AURIEMMA: I think. I think. I think she's healthier. She's put a lot of work in. The experience that she's had playing in the tournament, I think certainly helps. Less wear and tear on her body for sure this past season. We were able to rest her, which we weren't able to do last year.

She has a different cast of characters around her this year than she's had previous years. Every year that she's been in the tournament, we've been at a disadvantage in terms of missing someone that was really key for our team. In some cases two or three.

So this is the first time we're going into the tournament with most of the key pieces intact. I think that's a great place for us to be, and it's a great place for her to be.