USF Gives UConn Women A Battle, Lose 75-59

By John Altavilla
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Updated: January 10, 2016

Since the birth of the American Athletic Conference in 2013, there has been an open invitation for a women’s basketball program with talent and gumption to stand up to UConn. You can have one without the other, by the way.

And for the last two seasons, the burden of expectation has fallen squarely on South Florida, a sturdy program still looking to play in its first Sweet 16 game.

The Bulls are the closest to making something dramatic happen against the 10-time national champion, who came into Sunday’s game at the Sun Dome 45-0 in conference play in AAC history

Ranked No. 22 in the nation, but without top senior forward and rebounder, the Bulls took another shot. It bounced off the rim. The Huskies used four three-pointers to start the fourth quarter to seal a 75-59 win at the Sun Dome.

“It was a really well-played game between two teams,” coach Geno Auriemma said.

The major component of this win was Morgan Tuck.

“She’s a big part of our team, offensively and defensively,” Breanna Stewart said of Tuck. “To able to spread the floor, with her three-point shooting and ability to get to the basket, really helps us.”

The superlative junior returned after taking off Friday’s game against Houston to rest a sore knee by dominating play pretty much whenever the ball was within her reach.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt, once you look at who contributes to the really good teams [in the nation], you’d be hard-pressed to find someone as valuable to their team as Tuck is to us,” Stewart said. “All you had to do was come to the Houston game [to judge her value]. She makes everyone on the team better. And the bigger the game, the bigger the stage, the more at stake, the better she plays and it’s been like that for pretty much her entire career.”

Tuck scored 22 points and added 12 rebounds. She had three three-pointers. Kia Nurse had 16 points. And Stewart added 12 points and 11 rebounds as the Huskies (14-0, 4-0) won their 51st straight game.

“Today was a good day [health-wise],” Tuck said. “We’ve been trying to make sure it would be the day [that she would come back]. I’ve been out the last couple of days, but I really wanted to play.”

Courtney Williams scored 26 points with 13 rebounds and freshman Kitija Laksa scored 17 with five three-pointers to lead the Bulls (10-4, 3-1). Before Sunday, USF was 9-0 at the Sun Dome.

The Bulls were without forward Alisia Jenkins, who already had 10 double-figure rebounding games this season. She sprained an ankle against SMU last week and her absence was a major loss.

That left the Huskies to deal with Williams, one of the best players in the AAC, and Laska, who became the first freshman in the league to score 30 when she lit up SMU for 38, shooting 15-for-24 from the floor and 8-for-12 from three in 30 minutes.

A pair of Laksa’s threes (the teams combined for 25 in the game) pulled the Bulls within 35-34 with 7:31 to play in the third quarter. Then UConn scored seven straight to put the weight on the Bulls could not lose.

“We know UConn is going to go on runs,” Williams said. “You just have to survive them.”

The final nails were drilled home by consecutive three-pointers by Moriah Jefferson, Tuck and Katie Lou Samuelson in the first two minutes of the fourth quarter. That put the Huskies ahead, 62-44.

“That run extended it [the lead],” South Florida coach Jose Fernandez said. “The game kind of exploded on us.”

Still, it didn’t stop the Bulls from making one last run that cut the lead to 69-57 and forced Auriemma to put Stewart back into the game.

Keep in mind that without Tuck, who played 37 minutes, the Huskies struggled at the start of Friday’s 75-37 win, trailing the Cougars 15-14 after the first quarter.

With much the same team returning, and UConn without Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis and Kiah Stokes, the Bulls hoped to build on the ultimate confidence-builder. In last year’s AAC tournament title game at Mohegan Sun, South Florida outscored the Huskies 47-38 in the second half on the way to an 84-70 loss. No team had treated the eventual national champion so gruffly.

This was a great game from the start when a pair of three-pointers from Laksa helped the Bulls open an 8-2 lead. That would grow to 14-6 on a three-pointer from Laura Ferreira with 3:56 to play in the first quarter.

Here was where the Huskies got moving. Three-pointers by Stewart and Kia Nurse cut the lead to 14-12 and got UConn moving on a 14-1 run that produced a 20-15 lead after a three-point play from Gabby Williams just 48 seconds in the second quarter.

That lead would grow to 26-19 before Courtney Williams, USF’s All-American, got things moving. She scored 11 points in the second quarter, including the last nine scored by the Bulls. And more than anything else, that is why UConn’s lead was only 33-28.

Tuck also had a great first half. She was 6-for-8 from the field with 13 points, showing no ill-effects from her knee. Stewart added 10. Jefferson played 39 minutes and Stewart played 36. Courtney Williams played 40 for the Bulls.