Geno Auriemma

Luigi "Geno" Auriemma (born March 23, 1954) is an Italian-born American college basketball coach and, since 1985, the head coach of the University of Connecticut Huskies women's basketball team.

, he has led UConn to 17 undefeated conference seasons (including eight consecutive), of which six were undefeated overall seasons, with 11 NCAA Division I national championships, the most in women's college basketball history, and has won eight national Naismith College Coach of the Year awards.

When he was growing up, his favorite team was the 1970s New York Knicks coached by Red Holzman.

For many years, Auriemma and his wife, Kathy, maintained a home in Avalon, New Jersey, to be near their parents in the Philadelphia area.

After graduating from West Chester University of Pennsylvania in 1977, Auriemma was hired as an assistant coach at Saint Joseph's University, where he worked in 1978 and 1979.

Prior to coaching at Saint Joseph's University he began his career coaching women's basketball at Bishop McDevitt HS in Wyncote, Pennsylvania.

He then took a two-year absence from college basketball, serving as an assistant coach at his former high school, Bishop Kenrick, before assuming an assistant coaching position with the University of Virginia Cavaliers women's team in 1981.

Prior to Auriemma's arrival in 1985, the Huskies women's basketball team had posted only one winning season in its history.

The decision to hire Auriemma was part of the university's commitment to better fund women's sports.

Auriemma's was the final interview scheduled by the search staff.

Most of the other candidates were highly qualified, and most were female.

One of those included in the interview process was Chris Dailey, who would become Auriemma's assistant and is currently the associate head coach.

Dailey was identified as the candidate most likely to receive an offer if Auriemma turned down the position.

Connecticut quickly rose to prominence after Auriemma was hired in August 1985.

After finishing 12–15 in Auriemma's first season (his only losing season), the Huskies notched their first-ever 20-win season, first conference title and first NCAA Tournament appearance.

They have also appeared in every NCAA Tournament since 1989–as of the end of the 2022–23 season, the third-longest active consecutive appearances streak in Division I.

Auriemma became a naturalized United States citizen in 1994 at the age of 40, noting in his autobiography that he finally decided to naturalize when his University of Connecticut team was slated to tour Italy that summer and he was concerned about potential problems, as he had never done any required national service in his birth country.

Connecticut has finished above .500 for 33 consecutive seasons, including six undefeated seasons (1994–95, 2001–02, 2008–09, 2009–10, 2013–14, and 2015–16) and three NCAA record streaks of 111, 90 and 70 consecutive wins.

Since achieving its first #1 ranking in the 1994–95 season, UConn under Auriemma is 186–10 when playing as the nation's #1 team.

UConn has won eleven national championships under Auriemma (1995, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2009, 2010, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016) and made the Final Four 20 times (1991, 1995, 1996, 2000–2004, 2008–2019).

Auriemma has also guided UConn to 21 conference regular season titles and 20 conference tournament titles.

The team has been especially successful on its home court in the Harry A. Gampel Pavilion on the UConn campus in Storrs, Connecticut, and in the larger XL Center in Hartford; they tied an NCAA women's basketball record with 69 consecutive home wins between 2000 and 2003.

Moreover, between Auriemma's arrival and the close of the 2005 season, UConn won 295 games versus just 31 losses.

The team set Big East Conference records for both single-game and season-long attendance.

Auriemma is also known for cultivating individual players, and the 13 multiple-All-America players—Rebecca Lobo, Jennifer Rizzotti, Kara Wolters, Nykesha Sales, Svetlana Abrosimova, Sue Bird, Swin Cash, Diana Taurasi, Tina Charles, Maya Moore, Stefanie Dolson, Bria Hartley and Breanna Stewart—whom Auriemma has coached have combined to win eight Naismith College Player of the Year awards, seven Wade Trophies, and nine NCAA basketball tournament Most Outstanding Player awards.

Auriemma was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2006.

Auriemma emigrated with his family from Montella in Southern Italy to Norristown, Pennsylvania when he was seven years old, and he spent the rest of his childhood there.

Auriemma had to teach himself English after coming to the United States.

The UConn athletics website also notes that, through 2006–07, every recruited freshman who has finished her eligibility at UConn has graduated with a degree.

Auriemma was the head coach of the United States women's national basketball team from 2009 through 2016, during which time his teams won the 2010 and 2014 World Championships, and gold medals at the 2012 and 2016 Summer Olympics, going undefeated in all four tournaments.

At the end of the 2009–10 season, he had a record of 127–52 against top 25 opponents and a 57–35 record against top 10 opponents.

On December 21, 2010, Auriemma led UConn to its 89th consecutive victory, one more than the all-time NCAA men's wins record of 88 held by UCLA; the streak ended at 90 wins.

That record was broken in 2011.

The last home loss was to Villanova in the game that ended their 70-game winning streak.

They lost 17 conference games in the last two decades of play in the Big East Conference, and have never lost a conference game since the old Big East reorganized as the American Athletic Conference in 2013.

The Huskies subsequently broke their own record with an 111-game winning streak that began in 2014 and ended in 2017.

At the end of the 2014–15 season, Auriemma's record as a head coach was 917–134, for an 87.3 winning percentage.

That winning percentage is the highest among Division I active coaches.

His career at UConn also includes 20 seasons with 30 or more wins.

With the win in 2016, Auriemma passed UCLA men's coach John Wooden for most college basketball championships, and the Huskies became the first Division I women's basketball team to win four straight national championships.