The veterans for third-ranked UConn have fought through the pain to return in time for March Madness

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The veterans for third-ranked UConn have fought through the pain to return in time for March Madness

2025-03-15 22:33 Last Updated At：22:40

STORRS, Conn. (AP) — The injuries and the emotions might have been as different as the four UConn women's basketball teammates, but the desire to return to the court never waned for the quartet of Paige Bueckers, Caroline Ducharme, Azzi Fudd and Aubrey Griffin.

UConn headed into the Big East Tournament having played 143 games over the last four seasons and injuries have forced the veteran members of the third-ranked Huskies to miss 58, 82, 76 and 86 of those games.

Only recently have all four players been able to be healthy enough to hit the court for a UConn team eyeing a 12th national title. The hours in the training room and the tears shed behind closed doors have allowed them to create an unbreakable bond.

“We have been through so much,” Fudd said. “We have been rocks for each other, pillars to lean on and only we know the stuff we’ve been through and how we got through it.”

Griffin, Fudd and Bueckers all had ACL injuries at some point during their UConn careers.

Griffin has been at UConn the longest. She missed 36 games during the 2021-22 season and another 48 over the last two campaigns. She didn't make her 2024-25 season debut until a Jan. 19 win over Seton Hall. Griffin had at least 10 points in three of the final six games in the regular season. She sat out the Big East Tournament because of soreness in her knee.

“I didn’t want to give up,” Griffin said. “I wanted to continue to play the sport that I love.”

When this season began, the feeling was that Griffin would return to the court at some point. There was much more uncertainty for Ducharme as she worked her way back from a concussion that threatened to end her basketball career. Ducharme returned in a Feb. 22 win at Butler.

“There are two different ways you can go with this,” Ducharme said. “You can feel sorry for yourself and step away from the game when it is too hard to be involved in it. There were days when that would have been easier (to retire). What helped me is my teammates have always been there for me and have always supported me. They have always taken care of me when I have been down so I wanted to be able to do my part and still be a part of the team and have a role. I do still believe being a good part of the team isn’t just being on the court, I wanted to be there for them, support them and be somebody they can go to.”

Fudd missed 37 of 39 games during the 2023-24 season while Bueckers was forced to sit out the entire 2022-23 season. The two wanted to play together since they first were USA Basketball teammates. It hasn't been easy. However, they are hopeful that the best is yet to come.

"We have been through a lot together," Bueckers said. ""When you are going through tough times with somebody on a team, it makes it so much better because you are sharing that experience. You get to share the joy of what it is like to come back and to be playing basketball again and enjoy your last (year) of college together."

Ducharme said she plans on returning to UConn next season. Fudd, who could be a first-round pick in the WNBA Draft, is deciding whether to come back to UConn or embark on a professional career.

In the meantime, they look to lead the Huskies to a national championship.

“It has been fun for me to watch them navigate all of this because it hasn’t been easy for them,” UConn women's basketball coach Geno Auriemma said. "I am glad they are getting to finish it out in a way that they can be together on and off the court. They have been pretty tight together off the court but it is nice for them to finish with all of them on the court."

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Trump invokes 18th century law to speed deportations, judge stalls it hours later

2025-03-16 22:39 Last Updated At：22:41

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge barred the Trump administration Saturday from carrying out deportations under a sweeping 18th century law that the president invoked hours earlier to speed removal of Venezuelan gang members from the United States.

U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg said he needed to issue his order immediately because the government already was flying migrants it claimed were newly deportable under President Donald Trump’s proclamation to be incarcerated in El Salvador and Honduras. El Salvador already agreed this week to take up to 300 migrants that the Trump administration designated as gang members.

“I do not believe I can wait any longer and am required to act,” Boasberg said during a Saturday evening hearing in a lawsuit brought by the ACLU and Democracy Forward. “A brief delay in their removal does not cause the government any harm,” he added, noting they remain in government custody but ordering that any planes in the air be turned around.

The ruling came hours after Trump claimed the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua was invading the United States and invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a wartime authority that allows the president broader leeway on policy and executive action to speed up mass deportations.

The act has only ever been used three times before, all during wars. Its most recent application was during World War II, when it was used to incarcerate Germans and Italians as well as for the mass internment of Japanese-American civilians.

In a proclamation released just over an hour before Boasberg's hearing, Trump contended that Tren de Aragua was effectively at war with the United States.

“Over the years, Venezuelan national and local authorities have ceded ever-greater control over their territories to transnational criminal organizations, including TdA,” Trump’s statement reads. “The result is a hybrid criminal state that is perpetrating an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States, and which poses a substantial danger to the United States.”

The order could let the administration deport any migrant it identifies as a member of the gang without going through regular immigration proceedings, and also could remove other protections under criminal law for people the government targeted.

In a statement Saturday night, Attorney General Pam Bondi slammed Boasberg’s stay on deportations. “This order disregards well-established authority regarding President Trump’s power, and it puts the public and law enforcement at risk,” Bondi said.

The Tren de Aragua gang originated in a prison in the South American country and accompanied an exodus of millions of Venezuelans, the overwhelming majority of whom were seeking better living conditions after their nation’s economy came undone last decade. Trump and his allies have turned the gang into the face of the alleged threat posed by immigrants living in the U.S. illegally and formally designated it a “foreign terrorist organization” last month.

Authorities in several countries have reported arrests of Tren de Aragua members, even as Venezuela’s government claims to have eliminated the criminal organization.

The government said Trump actually signed the proclamation on Friday night. Immigration lawyers noticed the federal government suddenly moving to deport Venezuelans who they would not otherwise have the legal right to expel from the country, and scrambled to file lawsuits to block what they believed was a pending proclamation.

Boasberg issued an initial order at 9:20 a.m. Saturday blocking the Trump administration from deporting five Venezuelans named as plaintiffs in the ACLU suit who were being detained by the government and believed they were about to be deported. The Trump administration appealed that order, contending that halting a presidential act before it has been announced would cripple the executive branch.

If the order were allowed to stand, "district courts would have license to enjoin virtually any urgent national-security action just upon receipt of a complaint,” the Justice Department wrote in its appeal.

Boasberg then scheduled the afternoon hearing on whether to expand his order to all people who could be targeted under Trump's declaration.

Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign contended that the president had broad latitude to identify threats to the country and act under the 1798 law. He noted the U.S. Supreme Court allowed President Harry Truman to continue to hold a German citizen in 1948, three years after World War II ended, under the measure.

“This would cut very deeply into the prerogatives of the president,” Ensign said of an injunction.

But Lee Gelernt of the ACLU contended that Trump didn't have the authority to use the law against a criminal gang rather than a recognized state. Boasberg said precedent on that question seemed tricky but that the ACLU had a reasonable chance of success on those arguments, and so the order was merited.

Boasberg halted deportations for those in custody for up to 14 days, and scheduled a Friday hearing in the case.

The flurry of litigation shows the significance of Trump's declaration, the latest step by the administration to expand presidential power. Ensign argued that, as part of its reaction to the Sept. 11, 2001 attack, Congress had given the president power to delegate “transnational” organizations threats on the level of recognized states. And Gelernt warned that the Trump administration could simply issue a new proclamation to use the Alien Enemies Act against another migrant gang, like MS-13, which has long been one of Trump's favorite targets.

Associated Press writer Regina Garcia Cano in Caracas, Venezuela, contributed to this report.