UConn women’s basketball star Sarah Strong gave Marquette a few minutes of hope in Wednesday’s game at PeoplesBank Arena when she started 0-for-3 from the field.
But once Strong’s drought ended, it turned into a flood. The sophomore forward went on to hit nine consecutive field goals to finish with a team-high 22 points, leading the No. 1 Huskies to an 89-53 rout of the Golden Eagles. Strong also had seven rebounds, two assists, two blocks and two steals.
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Marquette entered the matchup as the No. 5 3-point shooting team in the country averaging nearly 40% beyond the arc, but UConn held them to just 5-for-16 from the perimeter and forced a season-worst 21 turnovers against them. The Huskies improved to 3-0 in Big East play, and their 36-point win was the closest conference game they’ve played to date.
“We’re trying to concentrate really, realy hard on taking some things away,” coach Geno Auriemma said. “In today’s world, you have to be really, really good defensively, defending the 3-point line, and I think that’s something that we’re constantly, constantly working on. That’s something that I’m never satisfied with.”
Behind Strong, three other UConn players scored in double digits. Star guard Azzi Fudd finished with 14 points and a team-high three steals shooting 50% both from the field and from 3-point range, and she sank a pair of free throws to maintain her perfect percentage on the season. Freshman forward Blanca Quinonez added 12 points for her second straight game in double figures, and senior center Serah Williams added 11 points plus six rebounds and three assists.
“(Serah) has played amazing these last two games, and you can just tell she looks more comfortable,” Fudd said. “I feel like we’re really, as it goes on, continuing to learn how to play with each other, how to play off each other’s strengths, how to play off the ball, the new people (learning) how to play in this new system. I think all of us, we’re happy with the progress that we’ve made, but we still definitely have improvement to continue to make.”
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Fudd dominated the first quarter on both ends of the floor, powering UConn to a 27-12 lead with nine points shooting 100% from the field. The star guard also snagged a pair of steals in the first three minutes of the game, and the Huskies continued to capitalize on the early defensive momentum. They forced turnovers on Marquette on the team’s first four possessions and finished the quarter with nine points off eight turnovers.
After her three straight misses, Strong also caught fire late in the first and into the second. She hit five consecutive shots to lead the Huskies with 13 points at halftime in just 16 minutes on the court. Williams also had an impressive start, missing a single shot in the first half for nine points. Fudd went cold shooting 0-for-4 in the second quarter, but Quinonez stepped in to fill the scoring void with seven points.
The Huskies’ defensive dominance kept them in control, sending them into halftime with a 25-point lead. They held Marquette to just three made 3-pointers and below 30% shooting from the field, also forcing another seven turnovers in the second quarter. The Golden Eagles didn’t hit a single field goal for the last five minutes of the half.
But Marquette also began to ramp up its defensive pressure in the second. The Huskies gave up 11 turnovers, tying their season-high for a half previously set in the second half against No. 6 Michigan. Strong matched her career-high with six of the team’s turnovers, and Auriemma said he had a conversation with her in the halftime locker room about forcing plays.
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“Some of it was just, I think, carelessness, and we talked about it, and there were none after that,” Auriemma said. “Sometimes she tries too hard to make a play for somebody else, and most of the time she gets it right. Sometimes she tries too hard to make things there, to make things be there that aren’t.”
Strong returned to the court hot in the third quarer, hitting four more field goals in a row to extend her streak. Fudd also ended her scoring drought with a 3-pointer that set the team on a 13-0 run as the Huskies kept Marquette without points for a four-minute stretch. UConn outscored the Golden Eagles 27-8 in the third, opening up a 44-point lead that allowed Auriemma to pull the starters for the entire fourth quarter.
The Huskies’ bench had another solid performance down the stretch with all seven reserves who saw the court putting points on the board. Sophomore guard Kayleigh Heckel tied her career high with six assists, and redshirt senior Caroline Ducharme hit her first field goals since UConn’s win over Loyola Chicago on Nov. 12 to finish with four points.
Ducharme, who missed almost all of the past two seasons with lingering head and neck injuries, played a season-high 13 minutes before checking out of the game and exiting the court appearing visibly nauseous.
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“Maybe that was too many minutes in a row, but she’s putting a lot of pressure on herself to try to get back to where she was,” Auriemma said. “She’ll have flashes where she looks really, really good, and then she’ll be less than what she wants to be and gets frustrated and tries really hard. So I’m glad some things worked really well for her today. She looks somewhat of her old self. It’s just being able to adjust to the new you.”
