UConn has produced a plethora of stars who have become superstars, from Diana Taurasi, and Sue Bird to Maya Moore to Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier.
Currently, Paige Bueckers is the star who shines brightest at UConn. She is the top WNBA Draft prospect and leads the team in minutes played, points scored and assists. The only thing left for Bueckers to accomplish is a national championship.
For her to achieve the accomplishment she’s been working towards her entire collegiate career, she’ll need to rely heavily on Sarah Strong, a freshman forward who has just stepped on campus.
The Huskies are Stronger with Sarah
Strong is the Huskies’ most-recent budding star, and she has taken off like a rocket during the first five games of her career. She is averaging 15.4 points, eight rebounds and 4.2 assists per game and had her best performance when her head coach, Geno Auriemma, needed it most. In UConn’s matchup versus the Fairleigh Dickinson, Strong scored a career-high 20 points in the win, helping Auriemma reach 1,217 all-time wins, giving him the most victories in NCAA Division I basketball history.
She’s our freshman ⭐
Sarah Strong is the Big East Freshman of the Week for the third straight time after notching 20 points, 8 assists, and 6 rebounds against FDU earlier this week pic.twitter.com/I0MyfswrMy
— Storrs Central (@StorrsCentral) November 25, 2024
The accomplishment is a grand one, but when you play at UConn, those kinds of achievements and standards are commonplace. This season, the pressure is on UConn to win it all in this championship-or-bust campaign for Bueckers, and under that pressure, Strong has shined bright like a diamond.
Strong has made an immediate two-way impact
Strong quickly has established herself as an elite scoring threat in the paint. She moves with the speed and agility of a ballerina on the block, but when she drives inside she strikes hard like a hammer. Her passing ability and touch are already at an elite level. How she sees the floor is an intangible that cannot be taught. She repeatedly makes the perfect read and finds her guards for easy buckets near the rim when she handles the ball up top.
The guard she often feeds is Bueckers, and this new tandem has worked together in perfect harmony. Whether Strong is just setting screens for Bueckers or switching things up and working as the the handler in pick-and-roll game, the combination becomes impossible to contain.
The sweat equity the pair has put into their partnership was evident in the opening matchup against Boston University, where Strong was dominant and ended the night with 17 points, six steals, four rebounds and three assists.
After the debut, Auriemma discussed what he saw from his freshman during his on-court interview with SNY:
Yeah. The big thing about about Sarah is that she’s going to score her points because she’s a natural scorer. But the things that she makes happen for the entire team, whether that’s a great pass that she’ll make or a couple of the steals that she got that you saw. She’s just an impactful player and I like when she’s aggressive like she was today, and I think today’s about what, hopefully, is the start of what we’re going to expect to see in every game.
Strong also has impressed defensively. Despite her size, she can be a tyrant on the perimeter and is excellent at jumping in passing lanes and successfully gambling to steal the ball. She is averaging 3.2 steals per game.
Although her tools are still raw, it’s clear she has more than enough to be the future of this iconic program.
What’s next for Strong?
Besides earning more reps and facing tougher competition, all Strong has to do is continue to be a sponge and absorb the knowledge Auriemma and her teammates are bestowing on her. So far, she’s doing just that, appearing ready to take on any challenge she has ahead of her.
Once she figures it all out and becomes the No. 1 option on this team, potentially as early as next season, she will be the best big in the nation. For now, she’ll have to settle for rookie phenom.
