Nika Muhl finished with eight assists, six rebounds and four steals on Saturday night in Portland, Oregon, as UConn turned up the defense in defeating Duke 53-45, a victory that punched the Huskies' ticket to the Elite Eight.
Despite a poor shooting night, Paige Bueckers scores 24 points to lead UConn past Duke and to the Elite Eight. stood much of a shot at making a deep March run. The team had lost multiple key players -- six by season's end -- for the year due to injury. By Dec. 3, they already had dropped three contests in nonconference play.that punched their ticket to the Elite Eight, surpassing last year's shocking Sweet 16 exit as well as Auriemma's previous expectations.
"Duke's a terrific defensive team," Auriemma said."They do a tremendous job of taking away some of your strengths and making you make plays that are not necessarily scripted. You have to make great reads. And it was really hard in the beginning because you felt like they have 13 points at halftime. And I felt like we should have 30."But scoring was not going to be easy tonight at both ends.
After the Blue Devils made their run, UConn made just enough plays to keep them at an arm's length, with forward hitting a jumper with just over a minute left, Bueckers draining key free throws and both coming up with big defensive rebounds. Edwards and freshman guard"You don't know what the path is going to look like, wherever you're going," Auriemma said on the tournament.
UConn has leaned on a seven-player rotation most of this calendar year due to injuries and played only six on Saturday. It wasn't supposed to be this way for the Huskies as the preseason No. 2 team, but since the middle of November, they lostand two others for the season due to injuries. With Fudd and Ducharme out within the first month of the campaign, they fell to 4-3 to when
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