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Message: [QUOTE="bballnut90, post: 2657717, member: 2117"] I don't think it was a slam dunk that Baylor beats UCONN in the Finals, but it made UCONN's path to a title MUCH easier as Baylor was the heavy favorite to repeat. No one had been successful in stopping Griner her last 2 years at Baylor and she had massive games against Dolson and UCONN both seasons. While Notre Dame had squeaked out wins over the Huskies and made plays down the stretch, Baylor just appeared to be a better team than Connecticut during 2013 aside from the Louisville game. I also don't think it's accurate to bring up 2010 or 2011 vs. UCONN...they had Maya Moore both years and both teams were significantly different in 2013 in terms of roster makeup and experience. In 2010 it was a long shot that Baylor would even make the Final Four, so to get there alone was an accomplishment rather than a failure to seal the deal. Sims was also injured in the Stanford game, so I wouldn't overanalyze that. Moreover, UCONN historically beats teams in a more dominating fashion than their competition, even if the competition is better than UCONN in a head to head matchup. Also, you're exaggerating UCONN's win over Notre Dame in 2013. It was never a 20 point game on the verge of being a 30 point blowout. The largest lead was very late by 19 points, and it was just a 6 point game with 6 minutes to go. More competitive than you're making it out to be. Notre Dame's big 3 (Diggins/McBride/Loyd) all really struggled shooting the ball (13-52 combined) and missed several looks they usually make. UCONN was the better team that night, no doubt, but I don't think UCONN had improved to the point of being 20 points better than ND as much as they were on that night and played their best game while ND didn't. To get back on topic, as far as fans bringing up how SC lucked out by not having to face UCONN last year...I think they 100% caught a much larger break than UCONN did in 2013. SC has never been able to keep a game competitive against Connecticut and UCONN had a much better year as a whole than SC did up to that point. If they did play each other, I personally would've put huge betting money on a UCONN victory. If UCONN played Baylor in 2013, I would've bet on Baylor, but I think it would've been a more competitive game than SC/UCONN. At the end of the day, Baylor didn't get the job done against Louisville which opened up an easier door for UCONN, and UCONN didn't get the job done against Mississippi State in 2017 which opened up the door for SC. Both 2013 UCONN and 2017 South Carolina were deserving champions. [/QUOTE]

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