Mohegan — Tasha Butts was named the Georgetown University women’s basketball coach on April 11, 2023. She died on Oct. 23 after a two-year fight with breast cancer. Butts, just 41 years old, never got to coach a game for the Hoyas.

On Monday, sixth-seeded Georgetown (22-10) will play in its first Big East tournament championship in program history, taking on No. 1 UConn (28-5) at Mohegan Sun Arena.

Georgetown upset No. 3 St. John’s 53-44 in the quarterfinals on Saturday night to reach what was the Hoyas’ first semifinal appearance since 2019. The Hoyas, under interim head coach Darnell Haney, then topped No. 2 Creighton in the semis Sunday night, 55-46.

Sunday’s monumental victory came on what would have been Butts’ 42nd birthday.

“That was a really shocking and difficult experience and has continued to be because of the nature of grief,” said Georgetown’s Graceann Bennett, asked how the team has handled the death of Butts.

“But what I know is true is how important and impactful coach Tasha was for us in the spring and in our fall practices and how clear it was that our next step was just to get back in the gym and work as hard as we could in her honor.

“It’s how she started the program, the foundation she set and it became our responsibility to do it moving forward and do it out of love for her.”

Georgetown’s Kelsey Ransom was a first team All-Big East selection and the Co-Big East Defensive Player of the Year, while Brianna Scott was named the league’s Sixth Woman of the Year and Bennett, a graduate forward, was honored as the Sportsmanship Award winner for the second time.

Bennett is the three-time Georgetown captain.

“The biggest things you have to understand with young people, especially young people who have been through some things, you have to be able to manage them emotionally,” Haney said earlier in the tournament. “I think the emotional piece, people start to forget they're not just basketball players. They're not just students. They're humans.

“... Right now we're on a journey. We're trying to just make sure we're doing one possession and one game and one practice and one shoot-around at a time, man, and we're just trying to do everything we do through love.”

‘Just listen’

UConn, which has started two freshman most of the year in KK Arnold and Ashlynn Shade, started three Sunday as redshirt freshman Ice Brady joined the lineup in place of senior forward Aaliyah Edwards, who broke her nose in Saturday’s quarterfinal-round game.

Brady played 40 minutes, finishing with 10 points and five rebounds and helping UConn turn in a stellar effort on defense which resulted in the Huskies shutting out fifth-seeded Marquette for the entirety of the fourth quarter on a 58-29 win.

Brady was the fifth-ranked recruit in the high school Class of 2022 and a McDonald’s All-American and won gold for USA Basketball in the 2022 FIBA U18 Americas Championship but missed all of last season with a dislocated patella.

She made just her second career start against Marquette.

UConn coach Geno Auriemma said with a laugh that the freshmen had “the majority” in the lineup during the game.

“We talked about it when we left shootaround this morning. We said there's always guys on the floor that know exactly what's going on; the danger is when they don't say anything. There's always people on the floor that will never know what's going on,” Auriemma said.

“Today, the emphasis was the players that actually know what's going on need to talk, and I mean talk nonstop the entire game. You other guys that don't know anything, you need to listen and just do what they tell you.

“Today was about as good an example of that as you can imagine.”

v.fulkerson@theday.com