Between Lynx and UConn, core of Team USA's women's basketball sets a lofty standard

Rio de Janeiro – Their seamless play obscures the fact that the U.S. women's basketball team, like most teams, is the product of interlocking cliques.

As the U.S. has advanced to another Olympic gold medal game with another series of dominating performances, Minnesotans can enjoy watching four Lynx players, including a former Gopher, and Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve (serving as an assistant) contributing to a 48-game winning streak.

Saturday (1:30 p.m.), the U.S. will try to win a sixth consecutive Olympic gold, facing Spain. The Lynx contingent will again be important, and so will another group: the Connecticut Connection.

Connecticut's Geno Auriemma has never lost an Olympic game as coach, and he has five former players on the Olympic roster.

Former Huskies star Diana Taurasi has been one of the most effective and fiery members of the team and is trying to win her fourth and last gold.

Point guard Sue Bird, a three-time gold medal winner who missed the semifinal because of a knee injury, said she is unsure whether she would try to play in another Olympics. Tina Charles starts at center, and Breanna Stewart is the team's youngest member.

As a Connecticut alum and Lynx star, Maya Moore is connected to both of the influential groups that make up most of the U.S. roster.

Does she ever have to explain to players not familiar with Auriemma what to expect? "Oh, Geno expresses himself pretty well," Moore said. "He doesn't need much interpretation."

Taurasi has announced this will be her last Olympics. After a game earlier in the Olympics, Auriemma noted that she had taken an elbow to the face without considering coming off the court.

"She's like one of those Spartan warriors," Auriemma said. "Hit her and she just gets stronger."

The U.S. women have built one of the most dominant streaks in modern sports history. Auriemma wishes his team would receive more credit for excellence and less criticism for overwhelming opponents.

"When you do it as often as they've done it and when you do it as consistently as they've done it, people just take it for granted," Auriemma said. "It's one of those things, 'Oh, the U.S. beat somebody by a lot? Big deal. They're not playing against anybody. Oh, the U.S. won 48 in a row? Big deal. Oh, they're playing in the gold medal game? Big deal.' Like everything has become, 'Of course they're supposed to be there.'

"That really misses the point of what it takes to get to that level all the time. I don't care how good you are; I don't care who the competition is. For 20 years to put yourself in that position, for 20 years, that doesn't happen just because it's an accident. There's a lot of people working really, really hard to make that happen."

The U.S. has been jeered, and has heard otherwise neutral crowds support U.S. opponents.

"Everybody loves the underdog," Auriemma said. "Everybody loves the guy who comes out of nowhere and climbs the mountain, and that's the big story. That guy who's been standing at the top of the mountain for a long time, they don't get a lot of respect."

This might be the last Olympics for Lindsay Whalen, Tamika Catchings, Taurasi and Bird.

In Tokyo in 2020, there should still be a strong Connecticut connection, and there should still be Lynx players, and perhaps coaches, representing the U.S. Without Taurasi's fire, the team won't look the same.

"You can check all the records you want," Auriemma said. "From the time she started her freshman year in college to today, you check and see how many championships she's won at how many different levels, and then put them up against anybody else. I don't know who comes close."