UConn women’s basketball returns from extended layoff with 63-55 win over Creighton

It wasn’t pretty, but a win’s a win.

In their first game in 21 days after an extended layoff due to COVID-19 issues, as well as their first Big East home game with fans since returning to the conference, the No. 11 UConn Huskies somewhat sloppily took down Creighton 63-55 to earn their second conference win of the season.

UConn (7-3, 2-0 Big East) remains undefeated in conference play since 2013, although this was the first time the Huskies haven’t beaten a Big East team by double figures since rejoining the league. They did, however, avoid back-to-back losses for the 1,033rd straight game, dating back to 1993.

Freshman Caroline Ducharme picked back up where she left off prior to the holidays, scoring at least 14 points for the fourth time in five games, finishing with a team-high 17. After scoring four points in the first four games of her career, she’s averaging a team-high 14.3 points in the four-game stretch the Huskies have been without Paige Bueckers. She also showed some improvement defensively, as she recorded a team-high three blocks in addition to her five rebounds.

“I thought Caroline has done an amazing job filling in that role,” said senior Christyn Williams, who had 13 points. “Today she had three blocks. She definitely had been working on her defensive efforts. I see it every day in practice. But yeah, she’s a scorer. She’s not afraid to shoot that thing.”

Graduate student Dorka Juhász and sophomore Aaliyah Edwards scored 10 and 12, respectively. Sophomore Nika Mühl returned after missing the previous three games with a foot injury and totaled two points, two rebounds and three assists.

UConn had a solid defensive outing for the most part, which compensated for its offensive struggles: The Huskies shot 45% and just 25% from 3 while committing 16 turnovers, half of which were traveling calls. They also saw their 17-point advantage shrink to eight in the final minutes of the game before pulling out the win.

“The offense looked really good at times, but we have to just get better at sustaining things,” coach Geno Auriemma said. “We allow something that happens to set us back, so we’ll take two steps forward, something will happen, we’ll take two steps back. And that hopefully is something we can work on in the next couple of days, the next couple weeks. ... The only constant that I’ve seen [as the team searches for its identity] is the inconsistency.”

UConn looked good early considering Sunday was its first game in three weeks, bouncing ahead 16-9 behind seven points on perfect shooting from Juhász. But Creighton (10-4, 5-1) hung around thanks to the Huskies’ nine first-half turnovers (including five traveling calls) and some defensive breakdowns leading to easy Bluejays baskets in the paint.

The Huskies led by as many as 10 in the first 20 minutes, but when the Bluejays cut the deficit to four twice, UConn responded each time: the first with back-to-back baskets from Ducharme and Edwards, and the second with a free throw from Juhász and transition layup from Ducharme, giving UConn a 36-29 edge going into the break. At that point, Juhász, Ducharme and Edwards combined for 28 of UConn’s points.

UConn pulled ahead by 11 early in the third quarter off a pair of free throws from Evina Westbrook, but some miscues on both ends allowed the Bluejays to score six straight points and make it a five-point game with 4:30 left in the period. The Huskies composed themselves and closed the third up 10, finishing the frame on a 7-2 run, before getting some breathing room early in the fourth behind another Ducharme basket, a Williams 3 and then a Williams layup to go up 56-39.

They turned things around starting with their defense, holding Creighton to just two points for roughly eight minutes spanning the third into the fourth.

“I feel like we have to get stops on defense for our offense to flow,” Williams said. “That’s been the big emphasis. Once we get steals and stops, everything flows on the other end, and I think we’re starting to pick up on that every day in practice and in games.”

In all, the Huskies held Creighton, which entered the game one of the most prolific 3-point shooting teams in the nation, to 5-for-25 shooting from the arc. But the Bluejays’ excellent offensive movement allowed them to outscore UConn in the paint, 34-28.

“They’re not an easy team to defend,” Auriemma said. “You’ve got to work really, really hard, and you’ve got to keep working. The minute you stop, they get a layup or they get an open 3.”

A sloppy final few minutes for the Huskies as Creighton intensified its defensive pressure helped the Bluejays cut the deficit to nine with 1:41 to play and eight with 16.5 seconds left, but they couldn’t pull any closer.

“I think it was progress in the first half of the fourth quarter, but the second half of the fourth quarter, I don’t know if it was mental fatigue and that we hadn’t played in a while, but I think we kind of let the pressure get to us a little bit,” Williams said. “That’s just something that we have to work on.”

Nika Mühl return

Mühl’s return after dealing with a foot injury was a welcome sight, but she didn’t do herself any favors: She ran over a Creighton player and got called for a foul 24 seconds after checking into the game for the first time and picked up a second foul early in the second quarter. She finished with four fouls in 17 minutes.

“It’s hard when you miss that much time and you haven’t practiced much,” Auriemma said. “She’s looked a lot better in practice than she looked today playing.

“I think she just has to understand that she’s not right all the time and that the refs are allowed to call fouls once in a while, that it’s not always their fault when you foul. And that causes her to not have a rhythm in the game because she can’t be in the game as long as she wants to be or for long stretches like she wants to be.”

Mühl was only supposed to play 15 minutes, ultimately logging just north of that at 17.

“All in all, I’m just glad that we got her the minutes we got her, and hopefully we can get a few more out of her this coming week,” Auriemma said.

Personnel updates

Auriemma said that junior Aubrey Griffin, who has yet to play this season, is having surgery Monday to repair a disk issue in her back. He reiterated that she’s unlikely to return this season.

He added that he’s hoping freshman Amari DeBerry will be “good to go this coming week,” while sophomore Piath Gabriel is not ready yet and will be “a little bit longer.”

Sophomore Azzi Fudd is “being allowed to do more and more each day, so hopefully she’s getting close,” Auriemma said.

Alexa Philippou can be reached at aphilippou@courant.com.