Back in 2016, when their matchups were gradually growing in fanbase, UConn Huskies coach Geno Auriemma acknowledged his rival coach\u2019s past. South Carolina Gamecocks coach Dawn Staley was a successful women\u2019s basketball player from high school, college, the WNBA and even at the national level representing Team USA.<\/p>\n
With this, as the Gamecocks were slowly becoming a force in the college scene under the tutelage of Staley, Auriemma reflected on the hype she generated when she was still an up-and-coming player. Auriemma expounded on this during their Feb. 2016 interview<\/a> with Mechelle Voepel of ESPN before their regular season game in that year.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like she was the original Mo\u2019ne Davis. From the time Dawn was in seventh or eighth grade, that\u2019s all anybody was talking about in girls\u2019 basketball. She had a reputation that preceded her when she got to Virginia [in 1988], and she was part of their greatest successes as a team. People remember Dawn as a great college player and a great player for USA Basketball,\u201d Auriemma said.<\/p>\n \u201cNot many of those players that do that go on to have great success as a coach. So for her to get her team to the level they are now, it\u2019s pretty amazing. I\u2019m very proud and thrilled I\u2019ve gotten a chance to work with her a little bit,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Currently in 2025, Auriemma and the Huskies recently defeated Staley and the Gamecocks in this year\u2019s NCAA championship game by 23 points, 82-59, to win their first national title in nine years since clinching in 2016. The Gamecocks were looking to snag back-to-back national championships with their 2024 one.<\/p>\n Geno Auriemma Was Reeling In One Of The First Of Many Matchups With Dawn Staley<\/p>\n Back in 2016, coach Dawn Staley and the South Carolina Gamecocks were still seeking their first national championship as an up-and-coming program. So, whenever they used to match up against Geno Auriemma and the UConn Huskies before then, it wouldn\u2019t be as big of a spectacle as it is now. But with the Gamecocks\u2019 ascension, it quickly being a highly-anticipated matchup that Auriemma was all in on when it started to become big.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not even about winning and losing on Monday night, from a big-picture standpoint. It\u2019s more the actual game itself, the idea that the No. 1 and 2 teams in the country are playing, and I hope that at the end of the game we can look back and say, \u2018That was a hell of a show,’\u201d he shared during the interview with ESPN.<\/p>\n The Huskies went on to win their Feb. 2016 matchup<\/a> against the Gamecocks, 66-54, and bring home the 2016 NCAA title, which ended up becoming their last of their 2010\u2019s four-peat and last before they won it again in 2025. For South Carolina, the program won their first of three national championships since then next year in 2017.<\/p>\n College Sports Network has you covered with the latest news, analysis, insights, and trending stories in\u00a0<\/a>college football<\/a>,\u00a0men\u2019s college basketball<\/a>,\u00a0women\u2019s college basketball<\/a>, and\u00a0college baseball<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back in 2016, when their matchups were gradually growing in fanbase, UConn Huskies coach Geno Auriemma acknowledged his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[402,398,400,401,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-33393","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-basketball","11":"tag-ncaabasketball","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}