UConn coach Geno Auriemma impressed with NC State, Wes Moore

UConn head coach Geno Auriemma has won a lot of games — 1,148, to be exact.

His latest win was over N.C. State in double overtime in the Bridgeport Regional final.

With the 91-87 victory, Auriemma is headed to his 14th straight Final Four.

“If you watched the game, there’s really not much that you can say to add to it,” said Auriemma, who’s won 11 national championships. “It was pretty remarkable. It’s one of the best games I’ve ever been a part of since I’ve been at UConn — regular season, postseason, doesn’t really matter.”

With the win, UConn advances to face Stanford in Minneapolis on Friday.

N.C. State is the only No. 1 seed not to make the Final Four.

Its path was challenging, having to first go through Notre Dame, the only ACC team to beat them, then UConn, playing in its backyard in Bridgeport.

The Wolfpack trailed by double digits in the first half and took the lead late before falling in the game’s second overtime.

“It’s a shame one of us had to lose, right? It would be great if both of us could go,” Aureimma said. “But if there’s two teams out there better than this one, holy moly.”

N.C. State ended the regular season ranked No. 3 in the AP Top 25 poll. Both of the teams ranked ahead of them, Stanford and South Carolina, will join UConn and Louisville in Minnesota this weekend.

“We played a team today, never thought they were going to lose,” Auriemma said. “We had the lead for like 39 minutes, and they played like they were winning the whole game.”

Impressed with Moore

Aureimma first met Moore when the N.C. State coach was at UT-Chattanooga, where he won 358 games, 12 Southern Conference regular season championships and made nine NCAA tournament appearances over the course of 15 seasons (1998-2013).

“I think he always had his heart set on going back to State, having been an assistant there,” Aureimma said. “And I knew that when he got that opportunity that he would do exactly what he did at UT Chattanooga.”

Moore has led the Pack to three ACC tournament titles, a regular season ACC title and the Elite Eight for the first time since 1998. When Moore arrived in Raleigh in 2013, Notre Dame, Duke and Louisville were the top teams in the league.

“I think it’s a testament to him, his staff, his players that, you know, the ACC for the longest time didn’t belong to NC State,” Aureimma said. “I think Wes went in there and changed all that, and he did it in a fairly rapid fashion, and he did it the right way with a great group of kids.”

Series coming up

If Aureimma was impressed with the Wolfpack on Monday, he’ll get two more shots in the near future to see Moore’s program up close. Next season, UConn and N.C. State begin a home-and-home series, which starts with a game in Storrs, Conn.

The Huskies travel to Raleigh in 2023. It’ll be the first trip to Raleigh in a while for Auriemma, who remembers playing against N.C. State for the first time when he was an assistant at St. Joe’s in the late 1970s.

“Reynolds Coliseum was one of the greatest arenas I’ve ever been in in my life,” Auriemma said. “I haven’t been down there in a while, and I’m looking forward to going down there.”

This story was originally published March 29, 2022 7:15 AM.