The Guru’s Daily March Madness Report: 1-Seed UConn Meets 6-Seed Notre Dame While 1-Seed UCLA Faces 3-seed Duke for Final Four Trips to Phoenix; 1-Seed Texas, 2-Seed Michigan, 1-Seed South Carolina, 3-Seed TCU Advance to Elite Eight

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsgurux

The Sweet 16 that has been reduced to the Elite Eight has all four No. 1 seeds still intact as the ticket punching for the Final Four this weekend in Phoenix begins Sunday afternoon with a pair of games on ABC in Fort Worth, Texas, and Sacramento, Calif., and then concludes Monday night in the same cities on ESPN.

Defending national champion UConn (37-0), the overall No. 1 seed which has been perfect 53 straight games beyond prior to claiming its 12th title in Tampa over South Carolina last April, will not have Hall of Fame coach Geno Auriemma against his former star Shea Ralph of Vanderbilt on the other bench in the 1 p.m. contest at Dickies Arena.

Instead, it will be in an encore performance for the Region 1 title game ticket against sixth seed Notre Dame (25-10), which eliminated the second-seeded Commodores 67-64 on Friday in a dazzling game from South Jersey’s Hanna Hidalgo of Merchantville with a triple-double of 31 points, 11 rebounds, and ten steals and the game-winner.

She also passed Lamar’s Chastadie Barrs’ NCAA record of 192 season steals set in 2018-19 and is one theft short of being the first with 200.

The two teams met during the regular season on UConn’s campus with the Huskies winning 85-47, the most lopsided outcome in the in what will be a 57-game series including meetings in the Big East and Final Four, but this will be the first in nine March Madness meetings at the Elite Eight, the Irish’s furthest advance since 2019.

UConn won its game Friday easily beating fourth-seeded North Carolina 63-42 as Sarah Strong scored 21 points with 10 boards to end the Tar Heels’ season at 28-8.

In Sunday’s other game at 3 p.m. at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento, UCLA (34-1), the second overall No.1 seed faces third-seed Duke (27-8), which had Friday’s most dramatic win as the Blue Devils, coached by former Tennessee star Kara Lawson, who will guide the 2028 USA Olympians, gave up a lead on second—seeded LSU (29-5) and then came back to win on Ashton Jackson’s 3-pointer just ahead of regulation time ending.

Tania Mair and Toby Fournier each scored 22 points for Duke, and Jackson collected 21 points.

UCLA had an easy time winning 80-56 over fourth-seeded Minnesota (24-9) as Kiki Rice scored 21 points and Lauren Betts had 16 points and five blocks.

On Saturday out West, South Carolina (34-3) avenged its SEC season loss to Oklahoma (26-8), Dawn Staley’s Gamecocks winning 94-68 as Ta’Niya Latson scored 28 points, while TCU (32-5) ended 10th-seeded Virginia’s Cinderella run 79-69 as Marta Suarez, who previously played for Tennessee and California, scored 33 points with 10 rebounds and Notre Dame transfer Olivia Miles scored 28.

TCU and South Carolina will meet Monday night in Sacramento.

 The Fort Worth Saturday games saw Texas (34-3), the other No. 1 seed, and three overall, win 76-54 over SEC rival Kentucky as Rori Harmon had 11 points, seven assists, seven rebounds, and six steals, while Jordan Lee scored 18, and Madison Booker had 17 points, eight rebounds and five assists.

Second seed Michigan (28-6) advanced to Monday’s game against Texas by cruising 71-52 over Louisville riding a 17-0 eruption in the third quarter. Olivia Olson scored 19 for the Wolverines and Syla Swords scored 16.

Michigan also overcame an early deficit by going on a 16-0 spurt in the second period.

The four No. 1 seeds were in last season’s Final Four, although UConn was a two seed upsetting Southern Cal, which had just lost national player of the year JuJu Watkins.