The Huskies battled for 40 minutes and just came up short.
UConn men’s basketball’s 13-game NCAA tournament winning streak is over, but the Huskies didn’t go down without a fight.
In a game few expected them to even compete in, the Huskies went toe-to-toe with the 1-seed Florida Gators for a full 40 minutes, outplaying Florida for long stretches of the game. But the Gators made shots down the stretch and UConn did not. Florida came away with a 77-75 win to advance to the Sweet 16.
With the loss, UConn’s quest for a threepeat comes to an end in the Second Round.
“I thought we played with tremendous honor,” an emotional Dan Hurley told CBS’s Tracy Wolfson after the game. I thought we played with the heart of a championship program.”
The game was a fascinating mixture of what was the 2024-25 UConn season and what it could have been.
UConn battled defensively in a way that it had not all year, led by seniors Samson Johnson and Hassan Diarra, who were everywhere in the first half. After the first few segments, it was clear that Florida was rattled and that the Huskies were playing with confidence.
And at no point did the latter change. UConn showed its championship mettle, answering every tough shot that the Gators hit — and they hit their fair share, particularly Walter Clayton Jr.
The Huskies played their best defense of the season, and Florida did not finally take the lead in the second half until there was 2:54 remaining when Clayton hit the first of two contested threes down the stretch.
“Credit Clayton, I mean, he made some NBA-level threes off the dribble to beat us,” Hurley said. “It took that for somebody to put us down in this tournament after winning obviously a bunch in a row.”
The Huskies weren’t able to match. They struggled from three all game as their inconsistency from distance came back to bite them. UConn went 8-29 overall, and that includes a meaningless buzzer-beating three from Liam McNeeley and a wild desperation shot from Diarra to end the first half. Overall, McNeeley went 2-8 from three, Alex Karaban was 2-9 and Solo Ball was 2-9.
McNeeley and Karaban, who have both had rollercoaster seasons, were at the center of the sequence that swung the game the other way. First it was a missed layup from Karaban — albeit one where there was some contact — that he appeared to make more difficult than he needed to. That led to Clayton’s go-ahead three.
Then, McNeeley committed a turnover trying to force something in transition, leading to a dunk from Will Richard.
Ball promptly answered with a three, but the Huskies then gave up an offensive rebound on a missed Alex Condon free throw, leading to a McNeeley foul and two more free throws from Clayton. McNeeley missed a three on the ensuing possession and Clayton hit one in response.
That put Florida up six with a minute left and effectively iced the game.
“They were giving us gifts,” Karaban said. “They were missing free throws, and we just didn’t capitalize on the opportunity. If we grab those rebounds, who knows what would have happened?”
Karaban later added that he didn’t want to take his jersey off and expressed sadness over not seeing Diarra and Johnson in the locker room next year. He did not reveal whether he intends to return for his senior year.
Those are the discussions that will begin in Storrs with the transfer portal set to open on Monday. McNeeley, a possible lottery pick, is almost certainly gone. As are Diarra and Johnson, who have exhausted their eligibility. Players like Ball and Tarris Reed Jr. will be the staff’s top priority to bring back along with one of the best incoming recruiting classes in program history.
UConn will have the pieces in 2025-26 to make another run. Putting it all together stars now.