Paige Bueckers completed her illustrious college basketball career in storybook fashion Sunday, helping lead UConn to an 82-59 drubbing of South Carolina in the 2025 NCAA Tournament championship game.
In the process, she made quite a few people 1,300 miles to the west of her school’s campus awfully proud.
Shortly after the Huskies completed their lopsided victory, the Minnesota Vikings’ official account on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, posted a photo from Bueckers’ childhood of her wearing a purple Adrian Peterson No. 28 jersey while holding a Vikings helmet.
Bueckers is a Minnesota native who was born and raised in the Minneapolis area.
The post included the caption “Buckets” — a shortened version of Bueckers’ nickname, “Paige Buckets” — as well as trophy and purple and yellow heart emojis.
Buckets 🏆
— Minnesota Vikings (@Vikings) April 6, 2025
💜💛 pic.twitter.com/OSjgeYpd8p
Though she opted to play college ball halfway across the country, Bueckers has kept a close bond with her home state. She is one of several standout basketball players to come out of Minnesota over the past several years, a group that also includes Chet Holmgren and Jalen Suggs.
Bueckers was a three-time Gatorade Minnesota Player of the Year at Hopkins High School, which she led to a 30-0 record and an appearance in the Class AAAA state championship game in 2020 before it was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As a senior that season, she averaged 21.0 points, 9.2 assists, 5.2 steals and 5.1 rebounds per game while being named the Gatorade Female Athlete of the Year and the Naismith ...
