The win record sets UConn’s Geno Auriemma apart. But his players’ legacies tell his greatness

STORRS, Conn. — If you thought UConn coach Geno Auriemma would immediately get all emotional and sentimental, then you probably haven’t been paying attention for the last 40 years. I’ll remember when they were 17 and the look in their eyes of, ‘Coach, can you help me do this?’ … Now we look back 40 years later, and I’ll say I don’t know how much I helped them, but they helped me get everything I wanted.” In the crowd were the players everyone knows: Diana Taurasi, a six-time Olympian and the WNBA’s leading scorer; Sue Bird, a five-time Olympian and the WNBA’s leader in assists and games played; Maya Moore, a two-time Olympian and four-time WNBA champion. But there were also players few remember: three players off Auriemma’s inaugural 1985 team, former walk-ons and those who never became Olympians or All-Americans. “To just point over there and say, ‘This is what I was fortunate enough to have.’ Not any coach in America has had the good fortune to have the players I’ve had.” GO DEEPER Geno Auriemma never planned to stay at UConn — 40 years later, he's about to set another record there When the festivities finally ended and Auriemma had a chance to sit down, he said the moments he would remember most from the night were the speeches from Bird, Moore, Taurasi and Rebecca Lobo.