The Aftermath: UConn's youngsters steal the show in runaway third quarter

Through the first 20 minutes of UConn’s contest with USF on Sunday, it was the Paige Bueckers show. The superstar carried the load by scoring 19 of the team’s 43 points while none of her teammates put up more than six.

She looked every bit the assertive, dominant version of herself that she promised to be during the preseason.

“Definitely want to start out every game aggressive,” she said. “Set the tone for what we want the rest of the game to look like.”

That continued early on in the second half when she drilled a 3-pointer to push the Huskies’ lead to 19. But those proved to be her final points of the night.

From there, the kids took over.

UConn’s freshmen and sophomores scored the next 25 points and ultimately accounted for 27 of the team’s 30 third quarter points. By the time the period ended, they’d nearly doubled the Huskies’ lead from 18 to 34.

“They're gamers. That's the only way you can explain how quickly they've picked up some things,” Geno Auriemma said about the youngsters postgame. “You want them to get better, a little better every game and today was a perfect example of that.”

It wasn’t that Bueckers stepped back and forced everyone else to step up, either. Sparked by a few turnovers that led to transition buckets, the underclassmen took charge on their own.

“It just happened naturally. Nobody was taking over or playing one-on-one,” Bueckers aid. “We were playing as a team, playing together, getting everybody involved.”

Ashlynn Shade led the push with 10 points in the quarter — with help from Sarah Strong (nine points), KK Arnold (four), Ice Brady (two) and Jana El Alfy (two) — to continue a strong start to her sophomore season. She didn’t just rely on catch-and-shoot opportunities to score like she did last year. Instead, Shade attacked and used the entirety of her skillset to make an impact.

“She's an aggressive kid by nature. She's an athletic kid by nature. She's strong,” Auriemma said. “I don't think last year she took advantage of any of those things and she's made a concerted effort to do that (this season).”

To put it another way, Shade stopped thinking and just started playing.

“I think I feel more comfortable, more confident this year than I did last year,” she said. “I'm not thinking as much, I'm more sure of myself and I think that's reflecting on playing more free and more aggressive.”

Shade’s play wasn’t the only sign of progress on Sunday. As a team, the Huskies kept their foot on the gas through halftime. The Huskies cruised into the locker room on a 15-4 run — capped by a buzzer-beating 3-pointer by Shade — with their largest lead of the day. Unlike the opener where the team led by 47 at the break but only out-scored the Terriers 26-19 over the final 20 minutes, UConn buried the Bulls with a 30-14 margin in the third quarter.

“Good teams generally don't detract from themselves. When they find something that is good, they build on it,” Auriemma said. “We went into halftime on a little bit of a run and when we came out, we added to it. That's exactly what you want to see. That's what good teams do. They don't come out flat in the second half.”

In that third quarter, the Huskies succeeded by getting everyone else to stop deferring to Bueckers every time up the court. But while she didn’t score, she still played a big role simply by being on the floor. When Bueckers went to the bench for the entirety of the fourth, UConn managed just 13 points.

The Huskies are still pretty reliant on the superstar, but they’re working on it. Sunday was a step in the right direction.

“Even though Paige was out there in the third quarter, a lot of other people did a lot of the damage,” Auriemma said. “Sometimes I’d like to see us be a little more cohesive, but that's what you get. When you have a lot of players and you throw them in there, and you expect it to look like a certain way, it won't. Sometimes, like in the third quarter, it will — but only because she was out there. So now, can it look a little bit like that when she's not? Yeah, that's the next goal.”

Ice Brady’s impact

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