Despite winning a Sweet 16 game by 21 points on Friday night, Connecticut women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma was not in a great mood to begin his press conference on Saturday morning in Fort Worth, TX, before the Huskies play Notre Dame in the Elite Eight on Sunday.
Auriemma, a 12-time national champion coach at UConn, went off about the women’s NCAA Tournament double-regional format for the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight. In 2023, the NCAA switched from a four-site format to a two-site format for the women’s Sweet 16 and Elite Eight, while the men’s tournament remains at four sites.
He also blasted the new rims and basketballs that the NCAA brings in for these games. That was actually something he brought up in Friday night’s postgame press conference as well.
“You ever notice when you come to the regionals, they use brand-new baskets?” Auriemma said to the media after No. 1 UConn’s 63-42 win over No. 4 North Carolina Friday night. “These rims have never touched the basketball until now.”
“You ever notice when you come to the regionals, they use brand new baskets? These rims have never touched the basketball until now.”
Geno Auriemma talks about the new rims at the Sweet 16 and the teams struggling to shoot on them: pic.twitter.com/mkfRWWQ81g
— UConn Women’s Basketball Videos (@SNYUConn) March 27, 2026
Auriemmea opened his press conference on Saturday by mentioning shooting numbers in the tournament and going right into a rant.
“I’m going to read you some numbers, okay? Write ’em down,” Auriemma told the media after arriving for his press conference on Saturday. “4-for-20, 4-for-22, 1-for-17, 5-for-18, 4-for-16, 7-for-26. That’s the three-point shooting yesterday across the country. How many arenas are we gonna sell out with that bullsh*t? Now, maybe it was just a bad day shooting by everybody. These are all teams that average probably 30 (percent), over 30 for the season.”
Geno just went all the way off ..!!!!! pic.twitter.com/zqh8TOvgeC
— linds (@finestlinds) March 28, 2026
Auriemma followed that by explaining the inconvenient shootarounds, practices, and media sessions for teams with eight teams crammed into one building.
“You know what time our shootaround was yesterday? Six o’clock in the morning. 6:20, I think. For half an hour,” Auriemma said. “Now this morning, I just saw Notre Dame leaving. So, they have media this morning. Their practice time is tonight at 5:30. What did you have to ask them this morning that you didn’t ask them last night? Or us. You know what time our practice is? 6:30 tonight. So, we had to get our kids up; come over here. You already knew who we were playing last night. But we can’t get on the court. And neither can the other teams. [Louisville head coach Jeff Walz] had media at 7:30, I think. Does anybody who makes these decisions ever ask the coaches and the players, ‘Hey, does this work? Do you guys do this during the regular season? Is this normal?’”
Auriemma then pointed to attendance numbers with the two-site setup.
“Total attendance yesterday at both places- 18,000,” Auriemma explained. “If we had four regions, and you got a minimum 5,000 people… I think that comes out to 20,000. So, what are we doing here? Do you know when the last time they had a regional in the northeast? Probably because we were a No. 2 seed, and NC State was a 1-seed, and we had to play in Bridgeport. So, there will be no more regionals north of, I don’t know, I guess there’s one in Philly coming up. That’s just a personal pet peeve, because we’ve gone to the Final Four no matter where the regional was.”
“But I just don’t understand some of the decisions that are made about our game, when we’re trying to grow the godd*mn game,” Auriemma continued. “And I’m thrilled to be playing Notre Dame, because they’re damn good right now. So, there you have it.”
Auriemma then went back to shooting percentages with more talk on the rims and new basketballs to conclude his three-plus-minute rant.
“Well, you want to know the reason for these shooting percentages? I think. They bring in new baskets, new basketballs right out of the box. You got people dribbling the ball off their feet. You got people missing layups all over the place. You bounce the ball and it goes up to the ceiling. There’s just no concept of how basketball is played. Not that I have any of the answers; believe me. I just have questions.”
