Aaliyah Edwards was asked about the game slowing down for Paige Bueckers, the former national player of the year who has been Edwards’ teammate on the UConn women’s basketball team since 2021.

Slowing down, as in things sometimes appear easier for Bueckers, the whiz kid.

“I think that she sets the tone in that way, slows down the game not only for herself but for her team,” Edwards said before adding with a laugh. “It speeds up for me when I have to try to catch those passes (from her) sometimes. But I’ve been practicing and I’m ready for it.”

Edwards and Bueckers were named this week to the Naismith Trophy Women’s Player of the Year Midseason Team, with Bueckers leading the 15th-ranked Huskies with 20 points per game and Edwards following with 17.7 points and 9.0 rebounds.

They will also be among the four UConn players honored Friday night at Gampel Pavilion on Senior Night, joining senior Nika Muhl and graduate student Aubrey Griffin.

There will be the usual honors for the UConn seniors, with the Canadian national anthem in honor of Edwards and the Croatian national anthem in honor of Muhl being played prior to the game against Georgetown (7 p.m., SNY).

That proves to be an emotional enough moment in itself, such as last season’s playing of the Hungarian national anthem in honor of Dorka Juhasz and the French for Lou Lopez Senechal.

In addition to the emotion, however, there is also an air of mystery. Due to injuries, combined with the extra year of eligibility each athlete retains due to COVID, Bueckers, Edwards, Muhl and Griffin each have the opportunity to return to UConn next season.

None of the four have officially announced their plans, but all four will participate in Senior Night, presumably so they can all partake in the experience as a unit.

Over the five seasons the four have been in Storrs (this is Griffin’s fifth due to injury), the Huskies are 139-22 with two Final Four appearances (2021, 2022) and a bid in the 2022 national championship game.

UConn is 21-5 overall, 13-0 in the Big East Conference. Georgetown is 16-9, 6-8.

In Wednesday’s 86-40 victory over Xavier in Cincinnati, Bueckers had 20 points, seven rebounds and five assists while Edwards had 16 points and 10 rebounds for her 12th double-double of the season.

“We go to them a lot,” UConn coach Geno Auriemma said of the pair. “We try to get them going early. “For us, it’s nice that the other kids on the team have Paige and Aaliyah because it takes some of the burden off them; they don’t have to do more than they’re capable of doing so everybody just gets to do what they’re good at.

“But those two have got to do a lot more and they’ve pretty much responded every game this season. If we’re going to win the Big East championship, it’s going to be because of those two for sure.”

Bueckers said she and Edwards have always had good chemistry dating back to their freshman year, but because Bueckers missed part of the last two seasons due to injuries the tandem hasn’t gotten to play a full complement of games together.

But Bueckers said it builds every game.

“She gets me open. By her getting me open, she gets open,” Bueckers said. “We read each other well. She helps me out a lot. I would attribute a lot of my points to her getting me open.

“I feel like there’s not anything she can’t do. I’m confident when we get her the ball at any point on the floor ... I mean, she does it all.”

Edwards is equally as complimentary to Bueckers. She said that early in the season, Bueckers was working her way back from being injured and needed to fine-tune her dynamics with the team.

“But when she got it, we’ve seen what she’s been displaying and it’s been helping us win. It’s been helping us be successful,” Edwards said.

In addition, it was announced Thursday that UConn will compete in the first-ever Women’s Champion Classic on Dec. 7 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The event will feature a primetime doubleheader on Fox. Also playing will be Iowa, Louisville and Tennessee. The matchups and tip times will be announced at a later date.

v.fulkerson@theday.com