Princeton transfer Kaitlyn Chen commits to UConn

UConn women’s basketball dipped into the transfer portal and landed Princeton point guard Kaitlyn Chen, who announced her decision on Instagram Sunday morning.

Listed at 5-foot-9 out of San Marino, California, Chen played three seasons with the Tigers — the Ivy Leagues didn’t play during the Covid campaign in 2020-21 — under head coach Carla Berube, who played at UConn from 1993-97. Chen won the Ivy League Player of the Year Award in 2023 and earned First Team All-Ivy honors in 2023 and 2024. This past season, she received WBCA All-American honorable mention honors.

As a senior, Chen averaged 15.8 points, 4.9 assists and 1.3 steals in 34.9 minutes per game while shooting 48.8 percent overall and 32.8 percent from three. She helped Princeton win the Ivy League regular season and tournament champions, the latter of which earned the program its third-straight NCAA Tournament appearance.

Since the Ivy League doesn’t allow fifth-year players, Chen had to go elsewhere to use her final season of collegiate eligibility.

While UConn now has no shortage of guards, Geno Auriemma revealed in February that the team wanted to find a replacement for Nika Mühl at point guard through the transfer portal.

“So maybe you end up with nobody out of the portal, or maybe you end up with someone to fill the Aaliyah and Nika shoes, or somewhere in between,” the coach said on his radio show.

Chen now fills the void left by Mühl as a veteran ball-handler alongside rising sophomore point guard KK Arnold and the versatile Paige Bueckers. The Huskies’ backcourt is also set to include redshirt juniors Azzi Fudd and Caroline Ducharme — both of whom are coming off season-ending injuries — rising sophomores Ashlynn Shade and Qadence Samuels, as well as incoming freshman Morgan Cheli and Allie Ziebell.

The Huskies have one more scholarship left for next season, which they’ll likely try to use on a frontcourt player in the portal. Their top target is Oregon State transfer Raegan Beers, who is deciding between UConn and Oklahoma.