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An extraordinary sun warms up this early October afternoon in Brooklyn. The temperature should be way lower at this time of the year, but it’s almost like the sun is favoring us. Actually, to keep it a buck, not even all of us. Today, it’s more like the sun is shining a singular spotlight on Azzi Fudd. A summer full of nonstop movement in the life of No. 35 is concluding with her first-ever solo SLAM cover shoot.
This last echo of the summertime shine brings to mind the breeze of a day six months ago. On an early April day in Tampa, Azzi took a jackhammer to the illustrious history books of UConn and carved her name into forever. That day in Tampa ended the Huskies’ nearly decade-long championship drought. With a performance defined by precision, Azzi was named Final Four Most Outstanding Player, an honor that only seven other UConn women in the last 30 years have claimed.
The names—Rebecca Lobo, Shea Ralph, Swin Cash, Diana Taurasi, Tina Charles, Maya Moore and Breanna Stewart—encompass six WNBA All-Stars and three current Hall of Famers. And though Ralph didn’t go on to have a stellar career in the pros, she was on the UConn bench for 13 seasons as an assistant coach.
As an homage to joining this elite club, Azzi pulled up to our shoot with a custom set of celebratory nails featuring the numbers of these Storrs legends.
The historical significance can’t be overstated. UConn is the standard. Nearly 50 of its players have been selected in the WNBA draft. Nearly 30 of those players have been first-round picks. Six of those players have gone No. 1 overall. And for all of them who didn’t make it to the W, there are even more who have left a lasting footprint in Storrs.
Separation at UConn, where the list of accomplishments goes on and on, is cause for celebration.
And that’s where we begin our shoot with Azzi. She’s got her Huskies threads on and a you-can’t-guard-me kind of smirk running across her face. But then, a special guest arrives on our set. That smirk transforms into an ear-to-ear smile.
The special guest isn’t a person. Not a famous ex-teammate, not a noteworthy WNBA superstar. The special guest doesn’t have a heartbeat, but it does hold the dreams and memories of that April day.
UConn staff drove down from Storrs to New York with the brand-new national championship trophy. It’s the first time Azzi’s seen it in person since last April. One last look back to the 2024-25 campaign before she leads the squad into 2025-26.
“The feeling of…we really weren’t sure that was going to happen,” Azzi’s mom Katie tells SLAM of the squad winning the 2025 natty. “You go to UConn to win championships, and we hadn’t. And it happening, like, Holy crap, This is happening. This is so cool. Then they let us down on the floor and that was just…pandemonium, which was really cool. Just pure happiness, joy, peace. All this work, all the adversity that each of them have gone through. It’s not just Azzi who’s had adversity and the rest of the team is just smooth sailing. Everyone has hit some sort of roadblock and they’ve really worked through it. They worked through it together, they uplifted each other. So just that…” Her voice trails off, before she lets out a big sigh of relief. “That breath that you can take. It’s like, You did it.”
“Me and my teammates are so lucky to be playing for Coach [Geno Auriemma] and [associate head coach Chris Dailey] and to be a part of this UConn history,” Azzi says. “We’re in the history books. That’s crazy to say. [UConn] just got new banners, so our names are on the banners next to all the other past teams who have won. To have our names up there with all those other legends doesn’t feel real. It’s very surreal. I still get goosebumps when I look at it. I can’t look at it every day. Like, what the heck?”
“I just remember being elated and extremely happy for the girls,” says Azzi’s dad Tim. “They overcame a ton of adversity to be able to climb the mountaintop and accomplished the greatest goal as a college basketball player. They fought adversity and overcame close, tough losses in the tournament, the previous seasons and found a way to claw their way to the top, which was amazing!”
On that warm early April day in Tampa, Azzi and UConn got the storybook ending. Not only did they beat the Gamecocks, but they beat the clock. That matchup was their last chance before the Huskies’ roster changed in a dramatic way, as three seniors went off to the pros.
Now, this season, this team and even the nation belong to Azzi. The world is hers to conquer again, illuminated by a singular spotlight.
Even though she’s too humble to say it.
In her words, there’s more to this last season than the spotlight shining down on her.
“This year, I really want to embrace, not being in the spotlight, but being me and not caring about what other people think,” Azzi says. “I know my teammates will accept me no matter what, so just embracing who I am. I want the word ‘embarrassed’ to be out of my vocabulary. I want to be proud of everything I do. I want to do everything I do with confidence and with passion. I think that’s my goal, to show more emotion. Like, you see me score and I just kind of smile and I’m like, I don’t want to celebrate. That’s weird. It’s embarrassing. Like, who cares?! I want to have fun this year. This is my last year. I really want to enjoy and have fun. I want to appreciate every single thing. The hard, the good, the bad, the ugly, the beautiful—all of it.”
There’s a vision for her time in the spotlight.
And with that said, a lot is set to happen this year. She’ll have the ball in her hands and the ultimate green light to make plays for others, as well as herself. And that brings to light the perfect jumpshot of Azzi Fudd.
It couldn’t have just been Katie Fudd training her since she was a kid (but shout out to Ma Dukes, a former beast at NC State and Georgetown, as well as a draft pick of the Sacramento Monarchs in 2001). There had to have been a scientist somewhere in the DC area who had a hypothesis founded in years of studying basketball. This scientist had to have been trying to solve for the most technically proficient shot. Their checklist had to have included just the right amount of elevation from the legs, followed by the most 90-degree shooting elbow and a set of shoulders that are the utmost square and the kind of follow-through that forms a bridge from the top of basketball heaven back down to the hoop. Azzi’s jumpshot HAS to be the work of a genius-level scientist.
But that doesn’t account for her discipline or the way she consistently duplicates physical minutiae with superhuman accuracy. Her mechanics, down to the smallest level, deserve their own course on campus. Though they should be studied, these are the traits that can’t be emulated by 99 percent of basketball players. There’s nobody else with a quick trigger and the ultimate balance like her. There’s nobody else like Azzi Fudd.
People are noticing that. Business has been booming for her. She was part of the first-ever NIL class, and she’s spent the last four years honing in on what kind of partnerships bring her creative joy and speak to her on a personal level.
“The biggest sign of Azzi’s growth as a businesswoman has been the building of her brand. It has been gradual and a shift over time from one-off campaigns to long-term partnerships,” her agents at UNLTD Sports shared. “She’s earning her MBA at UConn this year. She is an extremely curious and authentic learner and has really leaned into building genuine relationships with the people behind each brand—founders, marketing leads, creative teams—so it’s not transactional. You see that in the way she’s grown with her brand partners, where she’s gotten to know the decision-makers and learned how businesses run from the inside out. This will have tremendous benefit to Azzi long-term. She’s also expanded into other mediums, like her Fudd Around and Find Out podcast, produced by Stephen Curry’s Unanimous Media and iHeart Women’s Sports Network. On her show, Azzi is finding her unique voice and showing a more personal side of who she is. It’s been amazing to help her go deeper with brands and platforms that align with who she is, especially in beauty and lifestyle, where her confidence and style naturally shine through, whether that’s at Fashion Week on a red carpet or prepping for a SLAM magazine cover shoot.”
Azzi was seemingly everywhere at NYFW this year. She’s been working closely with a team that has been helping her express visually. Just like the vision for her last year at UConn, she’s being true to her voice creatively off the court. Nowhere else was that more evident than at our shoot in early October. She collaborated with a stylist and designer to bring to life an extremely personal one-of-one piece.
Inspired by the legendary Jennifer Azzi’s 1996 Team USA jersey, Jocelyn Hu made a dress for Azzi to wear in honor of her namesake. Katie, a basketball savant since she was a kid, respected Jennifer Azzi’s game so much that she decided to name her first child after the pioneering point guard.
“Being able to wear the Jennifer Azzi jersey, first of all, that was incredible,” Azzi says. “It’s probably one of the coolest things I’ve ever worn. Even as I wore it, I just kept noticing more and more things about it. Having the honor to be named after her, like, my mom didn’t know if I was gonna play basketball. I would never be a doctor, but, like, I’m a doctor, I was named after Jennifer Azzi, though. Fun fact. It could’ve been something just so random. So the fact that this worked out and I play basketball and I’m OK at it and I’m named after a great is so special. That’s something I can always brag about. That’s, I think, one of the coolest things. And that’s something I didn’t even have a choice in. Like, shout out Mom.”
At our shoot, when Azzi showed off the whole fit, the energy in the room changed. The blending of past and present, art and basketball, impacted the whole gym. Everyone on set melted with joy under the weight of the moment.
Made by remixing the red ’96 kit, Hu removed the stars of the navy blue side panel and the number 8 on the front of the jersey and placed them on the train. She then flipped the back of the uniform to make it the front and sewed it all together with elongated red fabric. The custom piece was paired with a KidSuper suit. She actually pulled up to KidSuper’s NYFW show a few weeks earlier. And though nobody really knows what the future holds, it’s a fact that this was a signature moment for Azzi.
It was the last part of our shoot with Azzi Fudd, the face of college basketball for 2025-26, the hope of UConn fandom and the ever-expanding business powerhouse of the modern era. That spotlight isn’t going anywhere.
“I’ve had so much gratitude this last month,” Azzi says in a moment of reflection. “Going into the start of my last year, so much gratitude about everything. About just being at UConn and where I am in life.”
Stylist • Sydnee Paige
Hair • Hayley Logan
Makeup • Lionel Lashad
Nails • Sarah Maloney
Designer • Jocelyn Hu
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