We have to look at the talent and parity of that 2001 season as well. Just because UCONN has won 5 undefeated championships, doesn't mean the competition was all that great each of those years. The three loses came from Notre Dame twice and Tennessee once. But their teams were stacked compared to today.
One of those three loses came from a Tennessee team, who's 2001 roster was: Michelle Snow, Tasha Butts, Kyra Elzy, Gwen Jackson, Kara Lawson, Semeka Randall, Tamika Catchings, Kristen "Ace" Clement, Ashley Robinson, April McDivitt, Shalon Pillow, and a few more. All but one or two of them played in the WNBA.
Notre Dame had Ruth Riley, Niele Ivey, Alicia Ratay, and Kelley Siemon. No slouches .
Great comments. 2001 was just an outstanding year in women's college basketball when you look at talent across the board. UCONN had more talent on that roster than they've ever had, Tennessee might have had their deepest roster ever, and Notre Dame had the nation's best starting 5. Aside from the power 3, Georgia had the Miller Twins, Deanna Nolan, Tawana McDonald and Christi Thomas, yet they were only a 2 seed. Duke had Alana Beard, Tillis, Georgia Schweitzer and a lot of solid role players. Purdue had Katie Douglas, Camille Cooper, and 2 stud freshmen in Shereka Wright and Shalicia Hurns--Hurns was outstanding as a freshman and probably would have been one of the top players from the 2004 class, but had major off the court issues that derailed her career. OU had all of their studs from their 2002 runner up season, Stiles was the best scorer in the nation, and other teams like LSU, Florida, LaTech, Iowa State, Vanderbilt, Xavier, Texas Tech and Rutgers all had really strong programs in 2001.
That said, in regards to the best UCONN team to not win a title, my vote is 2011. I really thought they would roll to another title even after the Stanford loss and the first close call with Notre Dame. UCONN just looked better than everyone, and Maya Moore could score at will and was finally taking over games on a nightly basis and dominating the statline after deferring to teammates her first three seasons. I really thought she couldn't lose as a senior, and I didn't see that happening against Notre Dame.
2001 had the most talent of any UCONN team, but it was never evident that UCONN was head and shoulders better than everyone in college basketball that year. As I noted above, so many teams had outstanding talent. Notre Dame proved the first win by 13 wasn't just a fluke and they could not only hang with UCONN, but was capable of beating UCONN. Tennessee was so much stronger back then, too, and both match ups during 2001 were extremely competitive. Looking back the talent UCONN had was out of this world, but no one back then could've predicted the following:
1. Sue Bird would go on to win 3 Olympic Gold Medals and be widely regarded as the best point guard in the world for a long period of time. In 2001, it wasn't evident she was the nation's best point guard, and was badly outplayed by Niele Ivey in 2 out of 3 match ups.
2. Taurasi would go on to be one of the best players of all time. She showed great potential in the NCAA Tournament and her monster night at Tennessee, but she had struggles as a freshman, she only averaged around 11 ppg, had moments where she played out of control, and she was awful her last game.
3. Cash and Jones would go on to be main stays in the WNBA and earn multiple All-Star nods. Cash made good strides in 2001 but was a solid role player who I don't think anyone anticipated would be as successful as she has been. Jones had potential but didn't seem much improved from 2000.
All of these players have obviously turned into huge success stories, but back then none of them were close to being as good as they would go on to be.