Paige Bueckers jokes about love-hate relationship with Geno Auriemma

Shortly after the UConn women’s basketball team won the national championship on Sunday, star Paige Bueckers illustrated that — especially with star players and coaches — there is often a thin line between love and hate.

The blowout win allowed Huskies coach Geno Auriemma to pull his starters, including Bueckers. Immediately after the game, Auriemma was interviewed on the court by ESPN’s Holly Rowe and discussed what he said to Bueckers as the two embraced. Later during a postgame press conference, Bueckers was asked she was thinking while hugging her coach.

Bueckers said that she was thinking about how grateful she was to Auriemma for the role he played in shaping her into both the player and person she is.

“He told me he loved me, I told him I hated him,” Buecker said. Predictably, that drew laughter. “But we both love each other even though we hate each other some days.”

Bueckers continued.

“Every single relationship that I’ve built throughout the years here, you just try to encapsulate it in one hug, for five seconds,” she said. “But every single person that I went down the line and hugged just meant so much to me and meant so much to the team.”