UConn to take on UCLA Friday night in Final Four

Tonight is the night for the women's Final Four and UConn will take on UCLA at 9:30 p.m. on Friday in Tampa, Florida for a spot in the national championship.

Back here at home, UConn is holding a student watch party at Gampel Pavillion.

Doors will open at 8 p.m. Game time is set for 9:30 p.m.

The championship game is on Sunday and the winner will take on the winner of Texas vs. South Carolina, which will battle it out at 7 p.m. on Friday.

Of the four teams in a quest to win a national championship, none have lost more than three games this season.

UCLA, South Carolina and Texas are No. 1 seeds. UConn is a No. 2 seed but has certainly looked the part of a top-seeded team behind Paige Bueckers — perhaps the biggest star in the tournament who’s the primary reason the Huskies are the betting favorite to win it all.

Here are a few things to know as the Final Four begins.

This is Bueckers' last shot at a national championship.

She is widely expected to be the No. 1 overall pick in next month's WNBA draft. First, she gets one more shot at the national championship that has eluded her during her career.

Bueckers earned AP All-America honors this season and was the Big East player of the year for the third time. She has UConn back in the Final Four for the second straight year after the Huskies were beaten by Caitlin Clark and Iowa in the semis last year.

She has averaged 35 points in her last three March Madness games, including career highs of 40 points and six 3-pointers in the Huskies’ 82-59 rout of Oklahoma in the Sweet 16.

“I think last year I got so caught up in the pressures and the stakes of it all,” Bueckers said, “and trying to be perfect and worrying about the wrong things ... It’s the last year regardless of what happens. So I’m just enjoying this last weekend.”

And the Gamecocks trying to be first repeat champs since UConn.

Dawn Staley has her team in its fifth straight Final Four and defending champion South Carolina is trying to become the first repeat national champion since the Huskies won four straight from 2013 to 2016. That Huskies four-peat was coach Geno Auriemma's last title, though he has the Huskies in the Final Four for a record 24th time.

The Gamecocks, who went undefeated last season en route to the program's third title, beat Texas twice this season but have been on the ropes a bit during the tournament.

The Gamecocks went back and forth with Maryland in the Sweet 16 before finally doing enough in the final few minutes to put it away. They beat Duke by four points in the Elite Eight despite their offense being mostly stymied.

“I think we experienced a lot of things we didn’t experience last year,” said senior guard Te-Hina Paopao. “Every time we lost or did something, we learned from that opportunity and have grown from that opportunity.”

Tonight, UConn will face UCLA.

UCLA won a national title in 1978 in the pre-NCAA era of women’s basketball but made its first Final Four in three tries.

Lauren Betts has been one of the most impactful players of the tournament, leading the Bruins to the semis with 21.2 points and 8.7 rebounds per game while shooting 75% from the field.

The 6-foot- 7 center had 17 points, seven rebounds and six blocks against LSU in the Elite Eight despite sitting the entire second quarter in foul trouble.

The junior's teammates have praised her growth this season.

“I think it’s just me finally realizing the player I am," Betts said. “I think a lot of it has to do with not just the basketball side but the mental work that I’ve done this past season. ... Also I have to give a lot of credit to this program and the amount of confidence that they’ve given me.”