It wasn't meant as foreshadowing Wednesday when UConn women's basketball coach Geno Auriemma spoke to the media, telling the story of Shea Ralph's ACL tear during the 1997 NCAA tournament and how his team reacted.

"We were the best team in America by 100 miles," Auriemma said. "... I think we won every game by 35, 40 points at the time when the Big East was amazing and obviously our nonconference schedule was incredible and then in the first NCAA tournament game, Shea tore her ACL.

"The entire team reacted horribly to that. They actually reacted as if someone had passed away and it cost us in the NCAA tournament. We ended up losing in the Final Eight when we could have won had we handled it differently. So I think it's 'How mature is your team?'"

On Thursday, in No. 3 UConn's first game after a significant injury sidelined All-America point guard Paige Bueckers for an estimated 6-8 weeks, the Huskies, inarguably, reacted horribly. Georgia Tech beat UConn 57-44, holding the Huskies to five points in the fourth quarter and snapping UConn's 240-game winning streak against unranked opponents.

There was little semblance of order, with Auriemma later calling his team "disheveled" at a postgame press conference in which he seemed to be in shock at the turn of events.

The Huskies (5-2) take the floor again Saturday against UCLA (5-2) in the fifth annual Never Forget Tribute Classic — the tournament benefits 9/11-inspired charities — at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J (1 p.m., ABC). The event is a doubleheader with the No. 15 UConn men, who face St. Bonaventure at 3:30 p.m.

UConn played against Georgia Tech without Bueckers, the reigning national player of the year, who suffered a tibial plateau fracture in her left leg on Sunday, with the diagnosis announced Tuesday. The Huskies were also missing sophomore guard Nika Muhl, freshman guard Azzi Fudd and junior forward Aubrey Griffin due to injury, leaving eight players available for the game and just three guards.

Christyn Williams led the way against Georgia Tech with 13 points and Olivia Nelson-Ododa had 12 points and 10 rebounds.

"I knew today was going to be really, really hard," Auriemma said. "If you only have two days of practice but five of the players you have available are guards, practice is still going to be really, really good; when you have two or three days of playing and you have two guards and one guy you have to make into a guard and then the rest are big guys, practice isn't going to be any good."

Auriemma said he's unsure if the problem can be fixed any time soon.

"What I see is a team that's somewhat disheveled and that's on me," Auriemma said. "Somehow, some way, I do not have the ability at this point in time to affect my players to make sure that we're in a better place mentally and physically to play the kind of basketball we need to play."

Auriemma continued, calling the loss to Georgia Tech "self-inflicted."

"I've usually been pretty good over the years at making our players better. Our players get a lot better at UConn," Auriemma said. "They come in as really good players out of high school but they get better and better and better and better every year so that by the time they're seniors they're good to go, when they're juniors they're good to go. Right now that's not happening."

UConn puts its streak of 1,030 straight games without back-to-back losses on the line against UCLA.

The Bruins, led by graduate forward IImar'I Thomas (formerly of Cincinnati) with 19.1 points per game and junior guard Charisma Osborne with 18.5 points per game, are coming off a 112-33 victory over San Jose State on Sunday. Graduate guard Natalie Chou was named Pac-12 Player of the Week on Monday following a career-high 31 points against San Jose State.

UCLA, which is receiving votes in the Associated Press Top 25 poll, has four graduate transfers.

v.fulkerson@theday.com