TAMPA—Twenty-four years ago, for the first and only time in the history of the NCAA women’s basketball tournament, the Most Outstanding Player award went to a player who did not win the championship. Her name was Dawn Staley. If she had made a contested layup at the end of regulation in the title game, she would have scored 25 points in a Virginia win over Tennessee. Instead, she scored 28 points in Virginia’s overtime loss.
The final score did not really change anybody’s assessment of Staley’s play, and America had not yet overcooked the word “legacy.” The loss was hers to process; the performance was ours to admire. And this brings us to Paige Bueckers.
