It wasn’t easy, but they’re on to the next one. The University of Connecticut women’s basketball team just barely got by Baylor last night, 65 – 64, en route to their 80th consecutive win. It’s no secret that sports headlines are dominated by men, but what the Lady Huskies have been doing the past couple of years, and what they’re still doing, is nothing short of incredible and they deserve some shine here.
With 80 wins in a row, UConn is just 8 shy of tying the John Wooden-led UCLA Bruins men’s basketball program (they did this from 1971 – 1974) for the most consecutive wins in NCAA history, regardless of gender. Laugh at that if you want to, but that’s serious business. Granted, women’s college basketball players don’t leave early for the WNBA Draft as men do today, so therefore there’s not really that revolving door of new players every few years. Still, 80 in a row is 80 in a row and there is no way to minimize that.
During this streak, about a two-thirds of their 80 wins have come by way of at least 20 points and they win by an average (an average!) of 32 points. Wrap your head around that for a second. This is D-1 ball we’re talking about here. There has always been a debate over which is the best women’s basketball program: Connecticut or Tennessee. I’m sure Pat Summit would even agree that’s a silly question.
Last night the lady Huskies escaped Baylor by 1 point which was only their second single digit win during the streak. The only other was in the National Championship game against Stanford a season ago where they trailed for about half of the game, before winning by six. You would think that UConn would schedule high school caliber opponents early on in the season so that they could easily get to 88. Not exactly because Baylor is #2 in the country, so it’s not as if they have an easy schedule early on.
It helps that the Huskies have Maya Moore on their team. This is going to sound extremely insensitive and perhaps a tad sexist, but believe me, it’s intended to pay the highest compliment: Maya Moore plays like a guy. That’s a good thing. She had 30 effortless points last night and her game is as smooth as they come. She’s definitely the best player in the land and reminds of a female version of Carmelo Anthony the way she goes about her business. In recent years there’s been talk about who is the better lady Husky, Diana Taurasi (who many regard as one of the best women basketball players ever) or Maya Moore. Having played pickup ball with Taurasi (yes, I’m name dropping) where she was the only girl on the court, I can attest that she can play. But, she definitely isn’t Maya Moore. After playing three seasons at UConn, Maya Moore almost had as many points as Taurasi did in her four years.
The Huskies just lost all-everything player Tina Charles to graduation, so they may not beat up on the competition with as much regularity as they’ve done in years past, but they should still win comfortably in these contests. When they do pass UCLA for this record, it will interesting to see the type of reaction that it receives.
If you’re looking for your everyday, predictable basketball talk, then go somewhere else, because Kevin Burke of The Kevin Burke Project brings provocative, thought provoking content about basketball as only he can. Kevin also hosts The Hoop Doctors weekly podcast show, which you can subscribe to for free on iTunes. Follow Kevin on Twitter and Facebook
