Jessica Hill/AP
The University of Connecticut women’s basketball team is at the center of the sports world after advancing to the NCAA Tournament’s Elite Eight in dominant fashion on Saturday, beating Mississippi State, 98-38, in the Sweet Sixteen.
The win led to the latest round of criticism that UConn’s overwhelming dominance is bad for the sport of women’s basketball, including from Boston Globe sports columnist Dan Shaughnessy, who tweeted his scorn for the UConn women’s team after its 60-point Sweet Sixteen win.
On Monday morning, Jay Bilas ran an excellent segment on ESPN praising the UConn women and bashing those who dare call the team and their achievements “boring.”
“So you’re bored with UConn,” Bilas mused. “Let me ask you something. Mozart make you drowsy? The pyramids send you to your pillow? Tom Brady makes you tired? Not crazy about Picasso, does that bore you? If you find it boring to watch prolonged excellence that goes beyond just about any measure of dominance in sports, then you might want to get used to it. Because while you might say you’re tired of watching it, UConn sure doesn’t look tired of doing it.”
The whole segment is great, and it’s a reminder that even if you find yourself rooting against dynasties in sports, at the very least you still have to tip your hat to them.
Watch the whole segment below (via ESPN):
The backlash against UConn’s historically dominant program, and the ensuing backlash-to-the-backlash, has dominated the sports world and Twittersphere since Saturday. It has also distracted from the mind-boggling fact that the team has not lost since November 2014 and has a real shot to win it all four times in four years.