UConn legend Diana Taurasi spent two decades in the WNBA before ending her career in 2024, when the Phoenix Mercury limped to the end with 10 losses in the 13 games..
Her own experience offers a unique point of view for her college coach.
Apple TV’s three-part “UConn Huskies: The Dynasty” docuseries released Friday and focused on the question of coach Geno Auriemma’s retirement, with Taurasi lending advice to her former UConn women’s basketball coach informed by her own experience: “You don’t get to pick the way it ends — it just ends.”
However, as Auriemma begins his fourth decade in charge of the UConn program, he continues to speed ahead in search of the perfect off-ramp.
“When you do something for 40, 50 years, you’re supposed to have this big feeling of accomplishment,” Auriemma said. “You’re not supposed to have this burning need to keep going. That’s the one thing that keeps me going back.”
The Apple series documents Auriemma’s reign in Storrs from humble beginnings to his current dynastic perch, winning 12 national titles and more games than any coach in the history of Division I men’s and women’s basketball. Auriemma turns 72 years old, an age when many of his peers on this list elected to end their coaching careers — Tara VanDerveer retired as the all-time wins leader on the women’s side at 71, while men’s leader Mike Krzyzewski left Duke a few years later at 75.
By his own admission, Auriemma faced the perfect moment to step away from UConn last spring after trouncing South Carolina in the national championship game. It was an emotional culmination of a half-decade plagued by injuries and a season that pitted him at odds with superstar Paige Bueckers, who reconciled their differences with a teary embrace at mid-court and joined to lift UConn’s first trophy in nine years.
“If I was smart, I would have said into the mic, ‘I’m out, I’m done, see you. Arrivederci,'” Auriemma told Apple TV about the win over South Carolina.
Auriemma elected to return last season, when his Huskies, in pursuit of a perfect 40-0 season, stumbled at the penultimate hurdle in a Final Four loss to South Carolina. Sarah Strong will lead the next crop of UConn players, who hope to provide Auriemma with the perfect moment to end his long coaching career in Storrs.