What Kaitlyn Chen’s breakthrough performance against Villanova means for UConn women’s basketball

[ad_1]

STORRS — During practice this week, UConn women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma said he pointed out to first-year transfer Kaitlyn Chen that she hadn’t hit a 3-pointer in the entire month of January.

Chen, who graduated from Princeton last spring, sagely replied that there were more than a week of games still to play before the end of the month, and she quickly proved her own point in the Huskies’ 100-57 rout of Villanova at Gampel Pavilion on Wednesday night. Chen hit her first shot from beyond the arc since Jan. 1 early in the second quarter to give UConn its first 20-point lead of the game, then added another midway through the third that kicked off an 11-2 run for the Huskies. It was just her second game of the season with multiple made 3-pointers and the 12th of her college career.

“Seeing the ball go in today, that was just great,” Auriemma said. “I told her I couldn’t wait for January to end, because she was 0-for in January … But she’s a Princeton kid, so she said there’s still a lot of time left in January, and she was right. Today, she was really, really good. In a lot of ways, she was really good.”

Chen was Auriemma’s first transfer signee since 2022 and joined the roster with a reputation as a prolific scorer. She averaged 15.8 points, 4.9 assists and 3.8 rebounds in her senior season at Princeton, excelling against even top competition: Chen led the Tigers with 17 points and seven assists when they faced UConn at Gampel Pavilion back in 2022, and she led Princeton to three consecutive berths in March Madness averaging 17 points across five game appearances in the tournament.

But when she arrived in Storrs, Auriemma said he felt the graduate transfer deferring too much to the other stars on the roster. Surrounded by 11 former McDonald’s All-Americans on a court adorned with dozens of Final Four and NCAA Championship banners, Chen struggled to figure out where she fit with the Huskies.

“It’s not easy coming in and trying to fit with…

[ad_2]
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/kaitlyn-chen-breakthrough-performance-against-190000029.html

Author : Hartford Courant

Publish date : 2025-01-23 19:00:00

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.