Bulldogs end UConn’s epic winning streak
Against an absolute Goliath of a team the smallest player on the court rose up and hit a floater as the buzzer sounded over American Athletic Conference Defensive Player of the Year and second-team All-American and finished one of the biggest upsets in sports history.
Morgan Williams hit the game-winning shot in overtime over Gabby Williams to lift the Mississippi State Bulldogs to a stunning 66-65 victory over the Connecticut Huskies in the Final Four. The victory snapped UConn’s 111-game winning streak and put the Bulldogs into Sunday’s national championship game against South Carolina.
The entire season it appeared like it was Connecticut and everybody else as they approached another perfect season and a fifth-straight national championship, but it was another great reminder of why they play the games. Even though Mississippi State was 33-4 and runners-up in the SEC Tournament and regular season and a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament, it was inconceivable that the Bulldogs could beat the Huskies. But they did.
Many questions arose this year, asking if UConn’s incredible winning streak was bad for the sport of women’s basketball. Last year the Huskies demolished the Bulldogs but 60 points in the Sweet 16, showing just how top-heavy and unbalanced the landscape of women’s college basketball is. This proves that the winning streak was a great thing. UConn becoming this remarkable behemoth of an unbeatable powerhouse set up for this inevitable moment of a massive upset.
The Huskies winning streak eventually had to come to an end and now we have a new talk of the town created by one of the most incredible moments in recent sports memory. Without UConn’s great winning streak, the Bulldogs upset would have just been another college women’s basketball game. But because of the winning streak, it became an improbable victory and the top sports story that put the typical niche sport of women’s basketball at the forefront of all sports talk.
The Bulldogs never looked intimidated by their epic opponent. They came out swinging from the very beginning and held as much as a 16-point lead in the second quarter of the game.
So many times it looked like the Huskies were going to come back and win the game. They rallied all the way back to take a late fourth-quarter lead. They had the game tied late in the overtime with a chance to take a lead from the foul line. They had the momentum down the stretch of regulation. But the Bulldogs prevailed and overcame the great Huskies dynasty and are now the talk of the town.
Corey Johns
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