UConn women’s basketball wasn’t ready for its first road test of the season and fell at the hands of the No. 8 Notre Dame Fighting Irish, 79-68.
While the score remained close throughout the contest — the Huskies even got within one point late in the third quarter — UConn never seized control at any point. The Fighting Irish out-played and out-worked the Huskies en route to victory.
For the second straight year, Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo went off. She finished with 29 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists while hitting momentum-swinging shots throughout the night.
As for UConn, Paige Bueckers put up 25 points but struggled to find a rhythm. She scored 19 of her points in the second and fourth quarters but had just six in the other two. Sarah Strong (14 points), Kaitlyn Chen (11) and KK Arnold (10) also reached double-figures but it wasn’t enough.
The Huskies had a bad night from three, finishing just 3-16 from behind the arc, while also dealing with stretches of turnovers and poor rebounding. Notre Dame also shot 14 free throws compared to just five for UConn.
UConn struggled settling in from the start. Turnovers and poor shots plagued the Huskies in the early going, which allowed Notre Dame to jump out to a quick five-point lead. Strong turned the tide with back-to-back steals followed by back-to-back baskets that put UConn ahead for the first time but Hidalgo answered with two consecutive 3-pointers to put the hosts back on top.
After a rough first quarter, Bueckers came alive in the and scored 10 of the Huskies’ 16 points in the second period — which was pretty much all that went right for UConn. Strong went to the bench with three fouls at the five minute mark and the team suffered on both ends of the floor.
Offensively, the Huskies continued to struggle with turnovers and couldn’t converts the looks they got. Down the other end, they gave up far too many open shots — and Notre Dame didn’t miss.
As a result, UConn went into the half down by 11.
Out of the locker room, the Huskies scored seven straight points to pull with four. They got the deficit down to as little as one, only for Hidalgo to drill a 3-pointer at the buzzer to make 56-52 entering the fourth quarter.
UConn then erased all its progress in a matter of minutes. In their first five possessions, the Huskies turned it over three times and missed two shots while Notre Dame scored on three of its four trips up the floor. Just like that, the Irish went back up by 10.
From there, UConn couldn’t recover. The Huskies got as close as six with three minutes left before Notre Dame slammed the door with a 6-0 run that put the game away.
With its first loss of the season, UConn falls to 8-1. Next, the Huskies will return home to begin Big East play against Georgetown on Sunday. Tip-off is set for 1:30 p.m. ET from the XL Center.
