The UConn Huskies just came off of a fantastic March Madness performance, finishing as the runner-up in their championship game loss to the Michigan Wolverines. They came out victorious in the aggressive East region of the bracket. This region featured the tournament favorite Duke Blue Devils, along with the Michigan State Spartans, Kansas Jayhawks, and St. John’s Red Storm.<\/p>\n
The Huskies advanced to the Final Four dramatically after a buzzer-beater from freshman hero Braylon Mullins<\/a> gave them the win over Duke<\/a>. However, their runner-up finish on Monday is just one of many second-place finishes for UConn this season.<\/p>\n Dan Hurley and his Huskies had about as great a season as a program can hope for. They reached the Final Four and, to that point, the national championship game for the third time in four years. They survived a brutal East region where they took down both the 1-seed Blue Devils and 3-seed Spartans en route to the Final Four.<\/p>\n In the Final Four, they won decisively against the Illinois Fighting Illini. However, they fell short against the Wolverines. Michigan dominated for most of the game, never letting the Huskies get too close. This loss is not UConn’s first trophy disappointment this season. They failed to bring home the Big East regular-season and tournament wins this year.<\/p>\n St. John’s and UConn played this season at each other’s throats. As the regular season wound down, they were in a deadlock. The last weekend before the tournament, UConn had a chance to take home at least a share of the regular-season crown in their last regular-season game against Marquette. St. John’s had solidified at least part of it as they defeated Seton Hall the day before.<\/p>\n UConn was upset by the Marquette Golden Eagles that night, a loss that they were perhaps unable to shake come Big East tournament time.<\/p>\n St. John’s has gotten the 1-seed in the tournament as a result of the UConn loss. So, both sides were able to breeze through the bracket they’d meet for the championship. Indeed, they did meet in the final game. For context, the teams were 1-1 against each other in the regular season, with UConn blowing out the Johnnies by 32 the last time they faced one another.<\/p>\n The Red Storm returned the favor, beating the Huskies by 20 for the Big East title. UConn had returned trophy-less in Big East play, finishing as runners-up for the second time in a week.<\/p>\n Michigan went into this game as the favorite. According to Vegas<\/a>, they were poised to win by 6.5 points; they won by six. UConn put up a valiant effort. However, after Trey McKenney<\/a>‘s dagger shot as time expired, it became clear this was Michigan’s game.<\/p>\n Alex Karaban<\/a>, the two-time national champion and UConn legend, played great during the NCAA Championship game<\/a> for his final night. Scoring 17 points and grabbing 11 boards, he was the best player on the floor for the Huskies.<\/p>\n Although this year featured a lot of “runner-up” finishes for the Huskies, they did what other teams could only dream of. Even with these runner-up finishes, UConn demonstrated resiliency and grit, constantly weathering the storm. They consistently played great basketball, and the team’s effort gave them the chance to win another title. With that type of determination, UConn will always have a chance to achieve something great. If Hurley can retain some of this team’s talent and fill the void of Karaban and other non-returning players, there is no doubt UConn can have another run at a title.<\/p>\n Featured Image: Grace Hollars\/IndyStar \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The UConn Huskies just came off of a fantastic March Madness performance, finishing as the runner-up in their championship game loss to the Michigan Wolverines. They came out victorious in the aggressive East region of the bracket. This region featured the tournament favorite Duke Blue Devils, along with the Michigan State Spartans, Kansas Jayhawks, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5812,"featured_media":187781,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,773],"tags":[49687,4447,832,1744],"class_list":["post-187722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-college-basketball","tag-alex-karaban","tag-big-east-basketball","tag-ncaa-tournament","tag-uconn-huskies"],"modified_by":"Benjamin Yu","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5812"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187722"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187722\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":187783,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187722\/revisions\/187783"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The UConn Huskies And Their Many Runner-Up Finishes<\/h2>\n
Big East Meltdown<\/h3>\n
Championship Trouble<\/h3>\n
Going Into 2026-27<\/h3>\n