'What are you doing dude?': Social media reacts to Geno Auriemma-Dawn Staley altercation
Here's a sampling of the reaction to Geno Auriemma and Dawn Staley's altercation in the handshake line after South Carolina's Final Four win vs. UConn
The UConn women's basketball program came into the 2026 Final Four as a sizable favorite to take home its second national championship in as many years. Instead, the Huskies left Phoenix empty-handed after the national semifinals. Burdened by an uncharacteristically cold shooting night in which it made just 19 of its 61 field goal attempts (31%), including a 4-of-16 showing from national player of the year Sarah Strong, coach Geno Auriemma 's team saw its perfect season come to an end in a 62-48 loss to fellow No.
1 seed South Carolina in the national semifinals on Friday, April 3. REQUIRED READING: Geno Auriemma rants about South Carolina fouls: 'Been beating the (expletive) out of our guys' The loss snapped a 54-game win streak for the Huskies, which is tied for the fourth-longest run in Division I women's basketball history. UConn had won its first 38 games this season by an average of 37.
8 points, with only one of those victories decided by fewer than 13 points. The victory came with a measure of revenge for coach Dawn Staley and the Gamecocks, who lost to UConn 82-59 in the national championship game last season. Despite the comfortable margin of victory for South Carolina, there were some fireworks after the game when Auriemma and Staley got into a heated exchange while shaking hands at the end of regulation.
The interaction happened with a few tenths of a second remaining. Once the horn officially sounded and the game came to an end, Auriemma was already walking back to his team's locker room. Geno Auriemma exchanged words with Dawn Staley in the final seconds of South Carolina and UConn’s Final Four matchup.