Confetti is still falling on the heads of UCLA after its historic blowout win over South Carolina to capture the storied school’s first ever women’s NCAA national championship, and Gamecocks head women’s basketball coach Dawn Staley wants to keep that the focus.
During the game, ESPN color commentator and UConn alum Rebecca Lobo said on-air that Geno Auriemma had reached out to Staley to personally apologize after his public statement apologizing to South Carolina for his actions at the end of the Gamecocks’ Final Four win over Auriemma’s UConn Huskies.
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“Geno Auriemma certainly wrong in that moment, which he acknowledged in that apology yesterday,” Lobo said. “I know he has also since reached out personally to Dawn to apologize. It’s unfortunate that it happened.”
But Staley said she has yet to hear from Auriemma directly, though she did acknowledge that she has 800 unread text messages and just might not have seen it yet.
“That’s a Geno question … I have not heard from Geno,” Staley told reporters. “… I don’t know if he text or not, but … it’s UCLA’s day, right? Let’s keep (the conversation) UCLA, them winning the national championship. I will address all of that at another time.”
During the final seconds of South Carolina’s 62-48 drubbing of UConn, Auriemma confronted Staley. The two decorated head coaches exchanged words and had to be held back by their assistants. Auriemma later told reporters he was upset that Staley didn’t shake his hand on the sideline before the game, though ESPN later published video showing they had shook hands before then.
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“I have no idea (what went wrong on the sideline), but I’m going to let you know this. I’m of integrity,” Staley told ESPN sideline reporter Holly Rowe in her postgame interview. “So if I did something wrong to Geno, I had no idea.”
By April 4, Auriemma issued a public apology through the team’s Twitter account, though he did not mention Staley by name.
“There’s no excuse for how I handled the end of the game vs. South Carolina,” Auriemma said in the statement on April 4. “It’s unlike what I do and what our standard is here at Connecticut. I want to apologize to the staff and the team at South Carolina. It was uncalled for in how I reacted.
“The story should be how well South Carolina played, and I don’t want my actions to detract from that. I’ve had a great relationship with their staff, and I sincerely want to apologize to them.”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: South Carolina head coach has not heard apology from Geno Auriemma
