NEW ORLEANS– This year’s South Carolina’s women’s basketball team was a study in domination.
The No. 1 seed overall Gamecocks rolled to a 64-49 victory over Connecticut in Minneapolis Sunday night to win the program’s second NCAA tournament championship under Dawn Staley.
South Carolina which went 14-0 against teams ranked in the AP Top 25, became the eighth team to win multiple titles in NCAA basketball, joining UConn (11), Tennessee (8), Stanford (3), Baylor (3), Notre Dame (2), USC (2) and Louisiana Tech (2).
South Carolina was also only the 12th team to go wire to wire as the No. 1 team in the AP poll and win it all.
“Our path was divinely ordered,” Staley said.
South Carolina’s 35 wins are the most in a single season in program history, seven of them were over national championship coaches, and two were over UConn’s Hall of Fame coach Geno Auriemma, as the Gamecocks previously beat the Huskies 73-57, to win Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas.
Staley is now 2-0 in national championship games after coaching her team to a win over Mississippi State in the 2017 title game.
This was the first time Auriemma had ever lost in a title game.
“I felt like coming into this game, the conversation was about how coach Auriemma was 11-0 in title games,” Boston said. “But coach Staley was 1-0, and now she’s 2-0. And I think it just shows the type of program she’s built.”
UConn won four straight tournaments when Breanna Stewart was in school from 2013 through 2016 but have not won since.
National Player of the Year Aliyah Boston, the Final Four’s Outstanding Player, finished with 11 points and 16 rebounds, which allowed the Gamecocks to dominate the boards against the Huskies, 49-24. It was her 30th double double of the year. Guard Destanni Henderson had a career high 26 points to go along with four assists, two rebounds and a touch
Staley, who signed a multi-year deal worth over $22 million, is on the verge of replacing Auriemma as the sports’ dominant figure. She was a Hall of Fame player, winning three Gold Medals with Team USA and then coached the United States to a gold medal in the 2022 summer games in Japan. The Virginia All American from North Philadelphia got her start in coaching at Temple in 2000, leading the Owls to six NCAA tournaments in eight years before leaving to take the South Carolina job. She rebuilt the Gamecocks from the ground up. In her first six years, she improved her program’s record every year, winning the SEC in 2013-14. Staley had gone on to lead South Carolina to six SEC regular season championships, six SEC tournament titles, eight Sweet 16s, four Final Fours and two national championships.
On April 2, 2020, Staley became the first person to win the Naismith award as both a player and coach. She also won three major national Coach of the Year awards after she led her team to a 32-win season and a final ranking of No. 1 in both polls during a season cut short by covid.
Staley carries a piece of the net from the 2017 title with her- the same one from which she had previously sent segments to other Black women’s coaches across the sport– in her pocket. She became the first Black coach to win multiple Division I basketball national championships.
South Carolina started out hot in this one, scoring 13 of the games’ first 15 points and jumping out to a 30-12 advantage early in the second quarter. UConn didn’t have enough offense to catch up.
“I think they deserved it 100 percent,” Auriemma admitted. “They were the best team all year. The first five minutes I thought they came up and set the tone.”
There is every reason to think, with Boston returning for a senior year, the trend will continue. The goal next year? “Same as this year,” she said.
