Ole Miss women’s basketball to face UConn as part of Paradise Jam

Published 1:25 pm Thursday, May 10, 2018

Yolett McPhee-McCuin’s first Ole Miss women’s basketball team will get quite the non-conference test next season.

The Rebels will face perennial power UConn in their opening game of the Women’s Paradise Jam. Ole Miss will also face Purdue and St. John’s in the three-day tournament, which will be played Nov. 22-24 in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

The Nov. 22 matchup will be the first-ever meeting between Ole Miss and UConn, which has won a record 11 national championships, including four straight from 2013-16. The Huskies made their 10th straight Final Four appearance last season before being upset by Notre Dame in the national championship game to finish 36-1.

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Meanwhile, Ole Miss is ushering in a new era under McPhee-McCuin, who was hired to replace Matt Insell in April. The Rebels finished with the worst record in SEC play last season with just one league win and lost a program-record 13 straight games to end the regular season.

McPhee-McCuin also has to replenish a roster with five players having already left the team since the end of the season, including leading scorer Madinah Muhammad.