HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) - Central Florida’s Sara Djassi grabbed the opening tip against Connecticut and headed toward the wrong basket.
It was that kind of game for the Knights, who fell 83-35 Wednesday night and lost for the 12th time in 14 games.
“They do such a great job of capitalizing on other people’s mistakes,” said UCF coach Joi Williams. “A big focus for us was really being aggressive when we go up against a team like this, but I thought we got kind of passive against the zone so that was disappointing. UConn, they are a machine.”
Breanna Stewart scored 23 points, grabbed 13 rebounds and blocked seven shots to lead the Huskies (27-0, 14-0 American Athletic Conference), who won for the 33rd straight time.
Bria Hartley added 20 points, and grabbed four rebounds to become the third player in school history to record 1,500 points, 500 rebounds and 500 assists in her career. Freshman Saniya Chong chipped in with 17 points and 10 boards.
Zykira Lewis had 11 points to lead Central Florida (10-16, 3-12) and Djassi scored 10.
The Huskies held Central Florida to 12 field goals on 70 shots and outscored the Knights 44-6 in the paint.
Stewart’s first basket gave her 1,000 career points and started an 11-0 run that put the Huskies up 11-2. UConn used a 13-3 run later in the half to stretch the lead to 30-12, and it was 46-20 at halftime.
The Huskies opened the second half on a 22-2 run, and UCF hit just one of 22 shots during that 12-minute stretch.
“Obviously you’re not going to hold them scoreless,” said Williams. “But what we wanted to do was to try to limit some transition opportunities, which we didn’t do a very good job of.”
UConn has been beating its opponents by an average of 36 points this season.
The Huskies had 11 blocked shots, two over their season average. Stefanie Dolson, Stewart and Kiah Stokes all rank among the top 30 shot-blockers in the nation.
This was the final game of the season for the Huskies in Hartford. They have one more game at home on March 1 on campus, and in between head to Texas for games against Houston and SMU.
The winning streak, which dates back to last year’s run to the program’s eighth national title, is now tied for the fourth-longest in school history. The Huskies have the two longest streaks in NCAA history, a 90 game streak than ended in 2010, and a 70-game streak that ended in 2003.
UConn is playing with just seven scholarship players since losing forward Morgan Tuck last month to knee surgery and All-American Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis for up to six weeks with mononucleosis.
The Knights have been playing for the last month without their star, Briahanna Jackson. The sophomore scored 28 points in the first meeting with the Huskies, a 28-point loss on New Year’s Day. She left the team 10 days later for personal reasons.
“It’s an adjustment,” said Williams. “It’s a whole different team without her. The disappointing thing is that we knew that we were going to have to do it by committee to make up for her, and we’ve not had someone consistently take that up.”
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