Paige Bueckers says ‘God’s strength’ helped UConn win title

University of Connecticut women’s basketball star Paige Bueckers credited “God’s strength” after the Huskies won the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Women’s Basketball Tournament on Sunday. 

After Connecticut defeated the University of South Carolina 82-59 in the national championship game, the 23-year-old guard reflected on the experience of winning the coveted title for the first time in an interview with ESPN.

“If I could say one thing, it would be to stand firm in who you are,” she said. “There’s a lot of people who write you off, there’s a lot of narratives that could be trying to put you in a box, tell you ‘you got to do this,’ ‘you got to do that,’ ‘you got to more like this player,’ ‘you got to be more like that player.'”

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“There’s people that doubt you because they think you’re doing it on your strength alone,” she continued, proclaiming “We lean on God’s strength here.”

“We’re for God’s power, for God’s purposes. We’re not doing this alone, and we have the village that we lean on,” she added.

Sunday’s game marked the first time the Huskies won the national title for women’s basketball since 2016. The Huskies have won the national title 12 times over the past four and a half decades. The Huskies have won more national titles than any other women’s basketball team. 

This year’s national championship constituted a rematch of the 2022 contest between the Huskies and the South Carolina Gamecocks, which the latter team won. This year, the Huskies took the national championship title from the Gamecocks, who won that title against the University of Iowa last year. 

Bueckers has long discussed her faith on the national stage amid her athletic success. In a postgame interview following her team’s victory in a game against the University of Southern California that enabled the Huskies to advance in last year’s March Madness tournament, Bueckers described herself as a “living testimony” and asserted that “I give all glory to God.”

“He works in mysterious ways,” she asserted at the time. “Last year, I was praying to be back at this stage, and He sent me trials and tribulations, but … it was to build my character; it was to test my faith.”

Bueckers insisted that despite the challenges she faced, “I just kept on believing,” adding, “I did all I could so God could do all I can’t.”

After her team’s victory in the 2024 Elite Eight game against USC that enabled the Huskies to advance to the Final Four, Bueckers called it a “Godly miracle” because of the team’s depleted roster. 

“You can overcome anything with God on your side, with hard work on your side and with a belief and a faith and just the perseverance, the resilience,” she said.

“It’s all about how you overcome adversity in life,” she maintained.

Three years earlier, as the University of Connecticut advanced to the Final Four in the 2021 March Madness tournament, Bueckers recalled envisioning moments like those when she was younger, “but you never really know if you’re going to get those chances and opportunities.”  

Suggesting that God directly intervened to give her such chances and opportunities, Bueckers said she “wouldn’t be here without Him and just the confidence, experiences, and opportunities He’s given me.”

“I’ve just tried to shine and sort of make Him famous and use my light that He’s given me to shine on Him,” she added. 

“These opportunities — you dream of them as a kid, but you can get there with a strong work ethic and faith and just trust in God,” she contended.

Bueckers’ faith is displayed prominently on her Instagram page, which includes a reference to the Bible verse Proverbs 3:5-6. The Scripture passage encourages the faithful to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”