Mailbag: Starting lineup predictions, TV deal, best newcomer and more (part one)

A new era of college sports is upon us. On Friday night, a judge approved the House Settlement, which will allow schools to begin paying players for the first time. The entire landscape is about to change.

UConn will be okay. The Huskies have won national championships in four straight decades now. They’ve always adapted to the times and remained the standard in the sport. There’s no reason to think that’ll change.

Those are big-picture problems, though. For now, let’s dive into the nitty-gritty and look ahead to the 2025-26 campaign.

Some questions have been edited for brevity or clarity.

What’s your prediction for the starting lineup? — Terry A., Greg K.

KK Arnold, Ashlynn Shade, Azzi Fudd, Sarah Strong and Serah Williams is the most logical starting lineup. They’re UConn’s five best and most experienced players with a sizable gap to whoever the sixth-best player is. It’s a functional lineup, too, though there are some some factors to consider.

Last season, Arnold thrived a spark plug and defensive disruptor off the bench. Would Geno Auriemma prefer to keep her in the that role and start Kayleigh Heckel instead? Probably not. Unlike last year, when she played behind Paige Bueckers and Kaitlyn Chen, Arnold is the best point guard on the roster. That’s not a position to mess around with.

Auriemma also likes to bring a scorer off the bench. Shade provided that last season but the Huskies should have other options — whether it Caroline Ducharme, Morgan Cheli, Allie Ziebell, Kelis Fisher or Blanca Quiñonez.

Unless that aforementioned starting five fails to gel, consistently gets off to slow starts or gives Auriemma some other reason to change things up, that seems like the most likely lineup.

Where will UConn’s games be broadcast this season? — Mary B., Gary S., David B., William W., Bud J.,

After serving as the main broadcast partner for the team since 2012, SNY will no longer carry UConn games. That decision wasn’t made by either party but by the Big East. Last June, the league announced a new six-year media rights deal with Fox Sports, NBC Sports and TNT Sports. Unlike previous television contracts, every single basketball game will be carried by one of those three partners, so there’s nothing left for SNY to pick up.

So what will that look like? Essentially, Fox will get first choice of games, followed by NBC and TNT. Anything that isn’t selected — games that would’ve been on SNY in the past — will be relegated to either Peacock or Max.

UConn typically releases television information for the upcoming season in October, so we won’t know specifics until then.

Speaking personally, I think the Big East’s decision to cut SNY out is shortsighted. The network treated UConn women’s basketball like a professional team with pre and postgame shows, specials and all-around dedicated coverage. There’s ways the Big East could’ve gotten creative — games on SNY were already streaming-only for most of the country anyways — but the league took the easy way out.

The Huskies are arguably the most popular team, men’s or women’s, in the conference. They’re certainly the most successful. Preferential treatment would’ve been justified. Instead, the UConn-SNY relationship ended — a travesty for the team, fans and media members alike.

Do you expect Geno will use a larger regular rotation this coming season (nine or more, maybe subbing in five at a time) or will he stick to a 6-8 player rotation as he typically does, especially in tougher games? — John B.

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