Final Four roundtable: Can the UConn women’s basketball team take down defending champion Stanford?

The UConn women’s basketball team is back in its 14th consecutive Final Four and just two wins away from bringing home its 12th national championship.

The Huskies will face a tough test against a familiar foe in the Final Four — defending champion Stanford. The Courant’s Dom Amore and Lori Riley, Associated Press basketball writer Doug Feinberg, former UConn great and ESPN analyst Rebecca Lobo and ESPN reporter Holly Rowe discuss what players will be key to a UConn victory, how the Huskies bounce back after Monday’s double-overtime Elite Eight victory over NC State, predictions for Friday night’s matchup and more.

How does UConn bounce back from the double OT win over NC State and the tight turnaround to the Final Four?

Holly Rowe, ESPN: They’re young, and kids are so resilient. [UConn coach] Geno Auriemma has been vocal with us as we try to make the tournament more fair, that building in more rest days for the women would be more fair. Watching this practice [Thursday] is going to tell me a lot.

Dom Amore, Hartford Courant: They’re young folks, so the physical toll of what they have been through is probably less a factor than the mental, emotional toll. It was mentally draining to WATCH that game, so it probably took some time to recover. I would say, though, that four days is enough, and they did the right thing flying here and settling in on Tuesday.

Rebecca Lobo, ESPN: I’m wondering about that, even physically. They and Louisville have the shortest turnaround. How are they physically going to feel, emotionally going to feel? You’re on such a high. But they know how to do it, they know to recover.

Doug Feinberg, Associated Press basketball writer: I think Geno said this, the men have five days to recover and the women have less because their games were a day later and the Final Four was a day earlier. But we’re talking about 18-22-year-old kids. When I was that young and I played ball a lot — not at that level — I could play every day in a row and be thrilled. I think from the youth standpoint, they’ll be fine. I think the excitement and the adrenaline factor will also help. They’re at a real Final Four. Last year was a Final Four but it wasn’t really in a sense, there was no crowd, no energy. Paige [Bueckers] is coming home. There’s the extra juice, which could be good or bad.”

Lori Riley, Hartford Courant: It is a tight turnaround, especially with the draining double OT game Monday. I think the emotional toll of losing Dorka Juhász to injury and leaving her behind might be a little tougher mentally for the players. But they are young, as people have noted, so they should be OK physically.

How does UConn rebound from the loss of Juhász? Will the Huskies’ experience dealing with injuries this season help them adjust?

Rowe: I think it narrows their margin for error in a dramatic fashion. How many times this year we’ve said if Olivia Nelson-Ododa doesn’t get in foul trouble, they can win? Their bigs cannot get in foul trouble or they won’t win this game. It puts a lot of pressure on Olivia and Aaliyah [Edwards] to play smart and stay tough and aggressive. I think there’s an emotional component to it. I talked to Paige Bueckers [about Juhász] and she dissolved into tears. They’re so sad for their teammate. It’s been a hard year, and it’s one more blow.

Amore: This is a significant loss because a key strength for UConn against these better teams is having several frontcourt players. It nearly cost them the game against NC State because Dorka had been playing well when she got hurt, and ONO and Edwards got into foul trouble later. In fact, Geno mentioned that when Dorka came from Ohio State, he thought she would be a difference-maker in games like this. So it hurts.

Lobo: Geno has said, “We’re going against the longest team in the country and we lose our longest player. She was playing so incredibly well in that game. But this is the story of their season. People have gone down, others have stepped up.

Feinberg: I think they can handle it because they’ve had to handle it all year with everyone going down or out with COVID. Mentally, they can handle adjusting to not having another person there that they normally would have. The matchup isn’t great for them because Stanford is so long, so tall, so big that you probably need a third big knowing that Olivia and Aaliyah get in foul trouble every game, it seems, at least one of them. Having that third big off the bench, they don’t have that. I think Evina [Westbrook] did a pretty good job after Dorka went out playing a bigger role. But Stanford’s bigs are really big and it will be tougher to do the same thing that she did against NC State.

Riley: This is tough because even though she only played three minutes Monday, she was making a big difference when she went down, and UConn sure could use her against Stanford’s bigs and depth Friday.

What are the keys to a UConn victory?

Feinberg: They have to shoot well. They have to be able to hit outside shots. They need [Azzi] Fudd and Bueckers to play the way they played in the NC State game for the entire game and hit outside shots and make Stanford come out and play them further out. Their bigs need to stay out of foul trouble. If both Olivia and Aaliyah get in foul trouble against a really deep talented group of bigs, UConn’s going to have to figure something out to stop them offensively, and that could be a problem.

Rowe: They have to be in the right spots in the right time. When they’re running their stuff the way Geno has it set up, they’re really good. When they make mistakes — this is still a very young inexperienced team — Azzi Fudd, you should look up how many basketball games did she even play in the last two years because of COVID and her high school season being delayed … but they are wildly talented and wildly connected because of all the adversity they’ve been through. Just hit shots. When Christyn Williams is aggressive and hits shots, that team is different. Also, Geno says they’re good right now and they’re here right now because in the last month their defense is something they can rely on.

Amore: Great teams need their great players to step up and make big plays in big games. We saw that when Bueckers, Fudd and Williams came up big Monday night. UConn needs them to do it again ... and again.

Lobo: The bigs staying out of foul trouble is hugely important. I think it’s going to be a great game. I don’t think you look at it and say this team has an incredible advantage. Stanford has great depth. UConn doesn’t have great depth in the post anymore. The three guards have to continue to make big plays and score and do their thing.

Riley: Bueckers and Fudd hitting their shots early in the game and setting the tone and keeping Stanford’s defensive focus on them and taking some of the attention away from the post players.

Which UConn player will pose the biggest challenge for Stanford?

Feinberg: Paige is the obvious answer. She was the best player in the country last year and looked like the best player for the last 30 minutes the other night. I think [Evina] Westbrook might be a key for them. She didn’t shoot well vs. NC State but she can hit outside shots and that will free things up.

Rowe: Stanford doesn’t get in their head about UConn. This is a program that has beaten them before. They snapped streaks before. Stanford is so supremely confident. They won it last year with basically the same group. I think they’re unbothered, in a beautiful carefree know-they’re-good, type of way.

Lobo: Paige and Azzi. Tara [VanDerveer] always has a great scouting report. They know how to neutralize certain players, but it’s really hard to neutralize Paige and Azzi.

Amore: UConn had a miserable night from behind the arc yet still beat NC State. The potential UConn has to dominate here, though, is their ability to shoot the 3. Geno hates taking Fudd out because she has the ability to blow a game open with 3s. Bueckers and Williams can shoot 3s, too. The biggest threat UConn poses is this ability to stretch the floor, making Stanford go out and guard the perimeter.

Riley: Bueckers. As she goes, so go the Huskies at this point in the tournament.

Give us some predictions for the Final Four.

Feinberg: I picked Stanford and South Carolina in my bracket three weeks ago in the finals and Stanford to beat South Carolina in the championship. But I was more impressed with the way UConn played the other night because Paige looked like Paige. It’s wrong for me to change what I picked three weeks ago, so I have to say Stanford’s going to beat UConn. But I’m less confident in that now having watched UConn play in the last two games.

Amore: I’m going with UConn. All four teams are talented and experienced enough to win it. but I feel like the Huskies have caught a second wind with Bueckers breaking through last game. They now have more or less the team they expected to have, so you can throw out their five losses, they’re ready to take a title that is up for grabs.

Rowe: I never make predictions because I think it biases my reporting because the ego wants to be right.

Lobo: I think Stanford-UConn will be tight and go down to the wire.

Riley: Probably won’t be an 87-60 UConn victory like it was in 1995. Stanford has a lot of confidence and is the defending national champion, but like Williams said Monday, UConn has Paige and they don’t.

Lori Riley can be reached at lriley@courant.com.