SAN ANTONIO (AP) — The University of Arizona stunned Friday as the Wildcats defeated UConn to advance to the women’s NCAA Tournament championship game for the first time in school history.
The Wildcats never trailed against the favored and fabled Huskies, who had made the Final Four 13 consecutive times.
Aari McDonald scored 26 points and helped lead the Wildcats' defensive effort as Arizona kept UConn to a season-low in points.
UConn has won 11 national titles but has lost in the semifinals in each of the last four tournaments. Christyn Williams led UConn with 20 points.
Back in 1998, the two basketball programs faced each other when head coach Adia Barnes was the Wildcats point guard. UConn won that game but Barnes is now leading the Wildcats towards the championship game against Stanford, the Associated Press reported.
The win comes after NCAA tweeted a video Thursday dubbed the "Final Three" by Arizona fans, because the Wildcats were left out of the video altogether.
The NCAA has since deleted the tweet. They told ESPN they didn't intend to leave Arizona out of the video.
The organization said they apologized to the University of Arizona in a direct message on Twitter.
"There are four teams that have worked really hard to get here. Stuff like that shouldn't happen," head coach Barnes said Thursday.
Arizona's win sets up an all Pac-12 final against Stanford at 3 p.m. Sunday.
After the (deep breath)...BIGGEST WIN IN THE HISTORY OF ARIZONA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL, we prepare to do it all again on Sunday. We'll take on Stanford for the national championship. #BearDown #ncaaW https://t.co/b3e9J5AN4a
— #BearDownMaskUp (@uarizona) April 3, 2021
