Midseason check-in: Who can stop a UConn repeat?

Despite losing guard Paige Bueckers from last season's national championship team, UConn has kept rolling in typical Huskies fashion.

A little more than midway through the 2025-26 regular season in women's college basketball, UConn and sophomore Sarah Strong remain the favorites to win the NCAA title and national player of the year award -- just as they were before the season tipped off in early November.

As great as Bueckers was at UConn, the Huskies are still lethal. The star combination of Strong and guard Azzi Fudd leads a deep squad that has a good chance at the program's seventh perfect season.

UConn's top challengers are much the same as last year: Texas, South Carolina and UCLA, which have one loss each. They made up the 2025 Final Four in Tampa and could do the same this year in Phoenix.

Still, this season has held some surprises -- good and bad. And after two weeks of upsets, several conference races should be exciting all the way to March. Plus, no matter how strong UConn looks, the other contenders aren't conceding anything. Here is what we've seen so far and our midseason All-America teams.

Can anyone overtake Sarah Strong in the national player of the year race?

Charlie Creme: Strong is the overwhelming front-runner and betting against the best player on the nation's best team that does not have an obvious weakness would not be wise. Still, while the gap is large, the race isn't over. Strong won't be easy to catch -- she had 18 points, 13 rebounds, 6 assists and 5 steals in 26 minutes against Creighton on Sunday -- but the other contenders -- chiefly, Vanderbilt's Mikayla Blakes and Texas' Madison Booker -- have opportunities to elevate their profiles.

The Commodores are 17-0, equaling the program's best start to a season, and Blakes is the country's second-leading scorer. If Vanderbilt shocks the basketball world and wins the SEC or even finishes in the top two, Blakes would be the catalyst for that, and it would also mean showcase wins over the South Carolina Gamecocks or Texas. The Commodores have already beaten LSU, demonstrating they are capable of big things. Blakes had 32 of the team's 65 points in that win. If she is that impactful every night against a regular dose of the nation's best teams in the SEC, Blakes will have to be considered a legitimate candidate for player of the year.

The same could be said for Booker. The Longhorns' hopes for an undefeated season disappeared in Sunday's loss at LSU, but it also showcased how important Booker is to Texas success. When she struggled early with foul trouble, the Longhorns fell behind. Their comeback fell short, but Booker fueled it -- on a perceived off night -- with 24 points on 10-of-16 shooting and seven rebounds. If Booker continues to produce those kinds of numbers -- especially in big games, such as against South Carolina on Thursday (7 p.m. ET, ESPN2) -- and the Longhorns don't lose again en route to an SEC title while Strong plays in uncompetitive Big East games, Booker should also be in the mix.

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Jazzy Davidson makes a great defensive play for the steal

Jazzy Davidson makes a great defensive play for the steal

Who's the freshman of the year front-runner?

Michael Voepel: It looks to be a race between two of the top-five recruits from the SportsCenter NEXT 100 of 2025: USC guard Jazzy Davidson (who was ranked No. 1) and Oklahoma guard Aaliyah Chavez (No. 3). They are also the only two of that group who have played throughout this season. The others -- No. 2 Sienna Betts of UCLA, No. 4 Emilee Skinner of Duke and No. 5 Aaliyah Crump of Texas -- have been limited by injuries. Betts is the only one currently active, though she has played in six of 16 games.

UConn forward Blanca Quiñonez also deserves mention as the Huskies' third-leading scorer (10.6 PPG), but with the team's depth she isn't likely to put up numbers this season that will overtake Davidson or Chavez.

They have been as good as advertised. The 6-foot-1 Davidson leads the Trojans in scoring (16.4), rebounds (6.9), steals (1.8) and blocks (2.6). In a year without injured star JuJu Watkins, Davidson has been carrying USC. The Trojans aren't the powerhouse they were the past two seasons, when they made the Elite Eight. At 10-6 overall and 2-3 in the Big Ten, they have work to do to guarantee a finish in the top half of the league.

Chavez is the point guard the Sooners have been waiting for, one who can run their offense at the speed they always want to play. The 5-10 Chavez leads Oklahoma in scoring (19.2) and assists (4.2) and is the team's leading 3-point shooter with 49. The Sooners (14-3, 2-2), got off to a good start in SEC play but are coming off consecutive losses.

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Aaliyah Chavez knocks down a tough jumper

Aaliyah Chavez scores the tough two for Oklahoma over the Kentucky defense.

What are the biggest challenges to UConn's hopes of a repeat?

Creme: Heading into the weekend Texas topped the list of UConn's chief contenders. The loss at LSU raises some questions about the Longhorns' ability to challenge the Huskies in the race to No. 1, but Texas plays the kind of elite defense and has size that could provide the Huskies some trouble in a one-game scenario. If UConn loses this season, the most likely scenario is that it occurs in the Final Four. Only once since 2007 has the Huskies' season ended earlier than that.

Texas also has a coach who knows something about beating UConn in the Final Four. In 2017 as coach of Mississippi State, Vic Schaefer orchestrated one of the biggest national semifinal upsets of all time. The Bulldogs beat the unbeaten and heavily favored Huskies, who had six future WNBA players on the roster and were going for a fifth straight championship, in overtime. These Longhorns are more talented than that Mississippi State team.

UConn overwhelmed UCLA in last year's Final Four, but these Bruins are long and experienced like no other team in the country. Coach Cori Close starts five seniors and brings another off the bench. Four players in her rotation are 6-3 or taller, led by 6-7 All-American Lauren Betts, one of the sport's best rim protectors (2.3 BPG). Only one Bruin who plays a significant role is shorter than 5-11. That's a big reason why UCLA is second in the country in points allowed per 100 possessions and has the fourth-best defensive rating, according to Her Hoop Stats. Those two characteristics could make a potential UCLA-UConn Final Four rematch much closer than last April's dominating 85-51 Huskies win.

Voepel: We've done this many times the past few decades: try to figure out how the Huskies could stumble when they don't appear to have real weaknesses. So here goes: Let's look at the only close call UConn has had this season, a 72-69 victory over Michigan on Nov. 21.

That game started like a lot of Huskies blowouts. UConn led 22-5 after the first quarter and was up by 18 at halftime. Then the Wolverines changed the game in the third quarter, outscoring the Huskies 18-4 as Michigan's zone defense limited UConn to two layups.

Then missed shots and turnovers frustrated the Huskies for the last 6-plus minutes of the third quarter, and Michigan closed the gap. It took Fudd's 3-pointer with 8:21 left in the game to wake up UConn's offense. Still, the Wolverines' confidence was high by then and the game stayed close until the end. Fudd was the difference-maker, finishing with 31 points, including seven 3-pointers.

Can a team during the NCAA tournament clog up UConn's offense enough to hang with the Huskies? The Wolverines at least provided some kind of blueprint.

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Highlight: Tonie Morgan, No. 6 Kentucky slide past No. 5 Oklahoma

Morgan puts up 22 points, including two 3-pointers, as Clara Strack records a double-double of 18 points and 12 rebounds to give the Wildcats a 63-57 win over the Sooners.

What has been the biggest surprise, good or bad?

Voepel: Three teams have been particularly good surprises. And Texas Tech has been the biggest surprise of all. The 18-0 Lady Raiders were picked to finish 13th in the Big 12 preseason coaches poll but currently lead the league at 5-0. Texas Tech, one of three Division I teams that are still undefeated, is seeking its first NCAA tournament appearance since 2013.

In the SEC, Vanderbilt is also undefeated. Despite losing two of its top three scorers -- Khamil Pierre and Iyana Moore -- to transfers, Vanderbilt has soared behind Blakes. The Commodores have not advanced past the early rounds of the NCAA tournament since 2009, but that could change this season.

Then there's Kentucky, which tied for fourth last season in the SEC in coach Kenny Brooks' first season in Lexington. The Wildcats lost one of the best point guards in college, Georgia Amoore, who was drafted into the WNBA, plus another top guard, Dazia Lawrence. Yet they picked up transfer Tonie Morgan, who has filled in well at point guard, averaging 14.4 points and 8.5 assists. And junior center Clara Strack, who came to Kentucky with Brooks last season from Virginia Tech, is having her best season yet. She is averaging 16.2 points, 10.1 rebounds and 2.9 blocks.

Creme: November and December were not kind to the ACC. In addition to a 3-13 record in the ACC/SEC Challenge and Notre Dame's 39-point loss to Michigan, stumbles included: NC State to Rhode Island, Duke to South Florida, Virginia Tech to James Madison and Pitt to Division III Scranton. Not much went according to plan. The ACC is rarely last when ranked against the Power 4, but the ACC's .672 nonconference winning percentage is .128 percentage points behind the third-place Big 12. The ACC is the No. 4-rated league and isn't close to No. 3. The Blue Devils might be the conference's best team right now at 6-0, but they were 5-6 against teams outside the ACC.

The ACC had four teams in the AP preseason top 15. Duke was considered a Final Four contender. NC State had similar aspirations. Louisville is now the only ACC program in the top 16 in Tuesday's Bracketology projection. It's possible the conference doesn't have any member hosting first- and second-round NCAA tournament games.

Because of the nonconference struggles, it will be difficult for the NCAA tournament selection committee to determine what a meaningful conference win is. The Blue Devils and Cardinals are 6-0 in the ACC, but it's hard to know what that means when their most significant result in the first two months was Louisville's two-point loss to South Carolina. Notre Dame just knocked off North Carolina on Sunday, but that came 10 days after losing to a Georgia Tech team that is still below .500 overall.

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Olivia Miles notches triple-double as TCU routs BYU

Olivia Miles had 12 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists to lead No. 8 TCU to a 72-48 victory over BYU.

Which players make our midseason All-America teams?

There was minimal debate on which players to include outside of which center should get first-team honors. While it was difficult to put the nation's leading scorer, Crooks, on the second team, Lauren Betts' ability to impact a game with her offense, rebounding, rim protection and passing won out.

First Team

Lauren Betts, C, UCLA
Mikayla Blakes, G, Vanderbilt
Madison Booker, F, Texas
Olivia Miles, G, TCU
Sarah Strong, F, UConn

Second Team

Audi Crooks, C, Iowa State
Joyce Edwards, F, South Carolina
Azzi Fudd, G, UConn
Rori Harmon, G, Texas
Hannah Hidalgo, G, Notre Dame