Associate head coach Chris Dailey leads No. 9 UConn women to second consecutive win, 98-73 over Seton Hall

The UConn women’s basketball team entered Wednesday’s matinee against Seton Hall without head coach Geno Auriemma, who sat out with flu-like symptoms for the second consecutive game.

Despite missing that key presence on the sidelines, the No. 9 Huskies (9-2, 2-0 Big East), led by associate head coach Chris Dailey, coasted to a 98-73 victory over the Pirates (9-4, 2-1 Big East) at the XL Center.

Dailey, who was been on UConn’s staff alongside Auriemma since he took over the program in 1985, has led the team to a 15-0 record when filling in for the Hall of Famer.

“He did FaceTime with the players before the game. And he’s feeling better, so that’s a good sign,” Dailey said of Auriemma. “I can’t speak for him, so I don’t know when, our hope is when we get back on the 25th that he’ll be with us. And if he’s not, you know, his health is really important obviously and that’s the priority, so we’ll deal with it. We’re going to enjoy and hopefully he’ll be able to enjoy some Christmas time with his family as well. And then when we come back, we’ll figure it out.”

Aaliyah Edwards led UConn with 23 points — her third straight game scoring 20-plus — along with six rebounds and four assists. Nika Mühl had a double-double with 16 points and 11 assists, plus five rebounds and three steals, while Dorka Juhász had one of her own with 10 points, 11 rebounds and four assists.

The Huskies had three other players in double-figuring scoring: Lou Lopez Sénéchal (14 points), Caroline Ducharme (16) and Aubrey Griffin (13).

UConn shot 60.3% from the field and 52.4% from 3-point range. The team impressed with its ball movement throughout the game and finished with 30 assists on 38 made baskets.

The Huskies outscored the Pirates 42-22 in the paint and had a 44-26 edge on the glass. They also held Seton Hall to 36.2% shooting from the field.

“On the court we trust each other, whoever is playing or whoever is on the court,” Lopez Sénéchal said. “CD is doing a great job of coaching us and I think that if we just stick together that’s the most important for us.”

UConn got off to a strong start out of the gates, jumping out to a 15-2 lead by the first media timeout midway through the first quarter. The Huskies opened the contest shooting 6 of 9 from the field while holding the Pirates to miss 10 of their first 11 shots.

Mühl spearheaded much of that effort as she drained three 3-pointers in the opening frame. By the end of the first quarter, which UConn led 25-10, Mühl was already up to nine points, two rebounds and two assists. The Huskies made five of seven 3-point attempts in the period, good for 71%.

UConn extended its lead to 20 points a little over two minutes into the second quarter, up 32-12 to force Seton Hall to call a timeout. The Pirates went on a 6-0 run in less than 30 seconds after that timeout to cut the deficit, but Mühl quickly halted it with another three from the left corner, reaching a career-high in made treys (4) before the midway mark of the second quarter.

“She was fire from the 3-point line,” Edwards said of Mühl. “So we kept feeding her and she kept knocking them down.”

Ducharme got going from deep as well, making three triples in the first half to lead UConn with 13 points at the break, at which point the Huskies were up 53-31. Edwards also reached double-figures in the first half with 12 points, while Mühl had 12 points and seven assists. Every active player saw the court in the first half.

UConn shot 65.6% (21 of 32) from the field and 60% (9 of 15) from deep in the first half with 18 assists on 21 baskets, but struggled to take care of the ball at times. The Huskies turned the ball over 13 times through the first two quarters, leading to 12 points for the Pirates — 38.7% of their production.

Edwards got hot in a flash in the third quarter, going on a personal 7-0 run for the Huskies in less than a minute. She first grabbed a miss from Juhász and put it back up for the score. On the following possession she scored an and-one bucket, complete with a make at the charity stripe. She scored on the next possession as well to give UConn 64-37 lead with 6:10 left in the period.

Griffin made a fast break layup after that, extending the Huskies’ advantage to 28 points, their largest lead of the day so far. That lead would grow to as many as 33 points in the third. They held Seton Hall without a field goal for nearly six minutes to end the quarter and entered the final frame up 79-48.

UConn rolled to victory with ease the rest of the way.

“I thought they showed great maturity to come out and play the way they did, but even more so the second half,” Dailey said. “Against Florida State, we came out like that and we were up, we had a big lead at halftime, and then we kind of took our foot off the pedal and the second half was what it was. And I thought today, the second half we showed the same kind of aggressiveness that we did in the first, which kept the pace and kept the score at a pretty good clip.”

The Huskies have a week off between games for the Christmas break before resuming play at No. 21 Creighton on Dec. 28. Due to the nature of the schedule, players will return to campus on the 25th, unlike past years when they would often return the following day.

“I think that we’re still obviously not complete with Azzi (Fudd) being out, but I think that we’ve kind of gotten over that hump of we’re back in our groove and back to doing the things that is up to our standards and our expectations,” Edwards said. “So I think that coming from the break, we’re just gonna keep feeding off of that momentum and keep doing the things that we do well.”