UConn women’s basketball loses conference game for first time since 2013 with 72-69 loss to Villanova

Sunday’s win over Tennessee may have represented the promise of this UConn women’s basketball team, but a mere three days later, on the very court in Hartford where the Huskies demolished a then-top-10 team, Wednesday featured an unraveling.

Aside from a valiant fourth-quarter comeback attempt, No. 8 UConn looked entirely disheveled against a hot Villanova team, ultimately falling 72-69 and snapping its tremendous streak of 169 consecutive conference wins dating back to Dec. 29, 2013.

The Huskies (15-5, 9-1 Big East) trailed by as many as 19 prior to a late run thanks to the heroics of freshman Azzi Fudd (career-high 29 points, 13 in the fourth), and senior Christyn Williams’ (24 points) pair of free throws pulled UConn within four with 26.2 to go. Even after Villanova’s Brianna Herlihy missed four from the stripe down the stretch, the Huskies couldn’t capitalize, and Williams failed to get off a last-ditch shot attempt in time to count.

“I thought except maybe for the last three, four minutes, I don’t think we did anything that deserved to win that game, and they did everything to deserve that game,” UConn coach Geno Auriemma said. “They played harder than us. They played smarter than us. They beat us to every loose ball. They rebounded better than us. They made more shots than us.

“Villanova came in here and won the game. Pretty simple.”

UConn’s bad luck with injuries and illness struck yet again, as not only did freshman Caroline Ducharme sit out (day-to-day with a head injury) but senior Olivia Nelson-Ododa was a late scratch. Auriemma said Nelson-Ododa “let us know after we put the [starters’] names in the book that she wasn’t going to be able to go.” The coach didn’t elaborate on what the exact issue was, though Nelson-Ododa was in uniform and remained on the bench beside her teammates. It was the first time the senior center missed a game in her UConn career.

“With the guys being out, we’re not going to use that as an excuse,” Williams said. “We have guys that can play. As long as we have five, we should be ready to go.”

In her second season coaching at her alma mater, Villanova head coach Denise Dillon became the second person, joining South Carolina’s Dawn Staley, to beat UConn as both a player and a coach. Villanova (16-6, 10-3) has now won 13 of its last 14 games.

“Their game plan was perfect and they executed offense perfectly,” Auriemma said.

Lior Garzon led the Wildcats with 19 points (5 for 10 from 3), while Maddy Siegrist and Herlihy chipped in 17 and 15, respectively.

“You forget that with the American what they’ve done and where they stand,” Dillon said. “I think it’s just us trying to embrace opportunity when it presents itself, and we feel that we’re on course with our group.

“We’ve got a four-hour bus ride back to kind of reflect and digest what just happened, the big picture of it, but in the immediate, it’s about these guys and the group we have in front of us.”

Without Nelson-Ododa’s inside presence, the Wildcats’ offense ran rampant and they dominated the glass. They shot 51.8% from the field and hit 10 for 22 from 3, while also besting the Huskies on the boards, 37-21.

“We’re just not the kind of defensive team that we have been in past years,” Auriemma said. “So if a team is able to get both things — in the lane, from the 3-point line — and then offensive rebound their misses, then you really don’t have a chance to win the game at all.”

While Ducharme and Nelson-Ododa were sorely missed, Fudd and Williams received little help from their teammates. No other UConn player had more than six points (Nika Mühl), and posts Aaliyah Edwards and Dorka Juhász combined for just two rebounds and six points.

Auriemma was left bemoaning his team’s “bad performance” and players’ lack of consistency from game-to-game in the same conference room setting where he projected his team could be good in March some 80 hours earlier.

“The roller coaster goes down, and then it goes back up,” Auriemma said. “And while you’re down, you’re down, and when it goes back up, you feel like you’re on top of the world. The only problem is staying there has become very challenging.”

Villanova burst ahead 25-15 by the end of the first quarter after hitting 5-11 shots from deep. Even when UConn started to figure things out offensively in the second, the Huskies still struggled to get enough stops defensively. They cut the deficit to five multiple times but soon after allowed Villanova to score on the other end, too.

UConn trailed 41-34 at the break, the Wildcats’ 41 first-half points the most the Huskies had allowed in the first 20 minutes this season.

Williams’ 3 made it a two-possession game early in the third, but Villanova quickly extended its lead back to double figures. Fudd’s 3 cut the deficit to 10 before the Wildcats hit three straight 3s to jump ahead by 19, forcing Auriemma to call a timeout. Outscored 21-11 in the third, the Huskies managed to get it within 17 going into the final frame.

UConn couldn’t get anything going offensively for most of the fourth, and with the team down 13, fans started to head for the exits with three minutes on the clock. But the Huskies found some life to go on a 17-5 run behind Fudd’s outburst (eight points in that span) and an uptick in defensive pressure from their press. Fudd converted a layup with 3.2 seconds remaining, but with no timeouts and forced to foul, UConn would’ve needed a small miracle to tie following Herlihy 1 for 2 trip to the line.

“You’ve got to lose at some point,” Auriemma said. “Otherwise, you’re not in a good conference.”

The road remains potentially treacherous for the Huskies over the next week, as they host DePaul Friday and take on Marquette on the road Sunday, both upper-echelon Big East teams.

Alexa Philippou can be reached at aphilippou@courant.com