BOSTON — Thirty points in a row, well, that’s quite a run.
The NCAA tournament streak the University of Connecticut men’s basketball team is putting together is pretty, pretty impressive, too.
The Huskies — the overall No. 1 seed in this year’s tourney and the reigning national champions — scored 30 straight points to power their way back to the Final Four, steamrolling East Region No. 3 seed Illinois 77-52 on Saturday night in a March Madness-record 10th straight double-digit victory dating to last year.
Donovan Clingan had 22 points, 10 rebounds and five blocked shots, and UConn scored the first 25 points of the second half to turn a five-point lead into an Elite Eight blowout. The Huskies, who cruised to their fifth national title last year, seem inexorably headed for a sixth: Their NCAA tourney wins this year have come by 39, 17, 30 and 25 points.
“We’re going to be tough to beat,” UConn coach Dan Hurley said. “It was a special level of basketball that we were playing.”