TAMPA, FLA. — Sue Bird, Diana Taurasi and Breanna Stewart gathered at the UConn Huskies‘ team hotel following their alma mater’s loss in the 2022 national championship game to South Carolina. The trio of UConn greats wanted to console the Huskies — and Paige Bueckers.
The defeat was devastating, historic. It was UConn’s first loss in a national title game after 11 previous wins, extending the school’s championship drought another year. And yet, the alumni wanted to reassure Bueckers, then a sophomore, that heartbreak was all part of the process.
“[The titles] never come without some really trying times,” Bird recalls telling Bueckers and teammate Azzi Fudd. “Even if you go 39-0 in a season, it still wasn’t perfect.” Bueckers’ tenure in Storrs, while undoubtedly impressive, has been far from perfect. Her freshman year was held in a bubble amid the COVID-19 pandemic. She missed more than half of her sophomore season and her entire junior year because of knee…
