Gianna Kneepkens stood with her teammates on the sideline, waiting for the clocks to hit double zeroes before she could run onto the court and celebrate her school’s first women’s basketball national championship.

The final buzzer sounded, confetti rained and Kneepkens ran onto the hardwood for one final time in her collegiate career. This time, as something she and her teammates had never been before: national champions.

At one point in time, she believed that she would be making history for a different school, by guiding the Utah Utes to their first Final Four. But a season-ending foot injury and the shocking departure of then Ute head coach Lynne Roberts led to Kneepkens transferring away from Utah for one last season.

She was — and still is — considered one of the all-time greats at Utah, and now, she is cemented into UCLA lore forever, as an all-American and starter for the Bruins’ first national championship team.

Kneepkens and the great “what-if” of Utah women’s basketball

The 2023 women’s NCAA tournament was one of the most iconic sporting events in recent history. The final image that most people remember from the tournament was LSU’s Angel Reese taunting national player of the year Caitlin Clark in the final seconds of the Tigers’ championship victory over Iowa.

But that moment almost never happened.

In the Sweet 16, No. 3 LSU narrowly defeated Kneepkens — who was a sophomore guard and a first-team All-Pac 12 player — and the No. 2-seeded Utes by three points in a game that came down to the final possession. It was the closest margin of victory of any game that LSU had played in the tournament.

Kneepkens had to watch the Tigers lift the championship trophy from home, knowing that if some free throws had gone Utah’s way, that easily could have been her facing off against the Hawkeyes.

“As a competitor, you look to that moment and you think like, ‘Oh I wish that could’ve been us,’” Kneepkens said. “That definitely gave me a little fuel.”

That offseason, Utah remarkably kept every significant impact player, including Alissa Pili, the 2023 Pac-12 player of the year.

Between Pili and Kneepkens, the Utes entered the season ranked No. 5 in the country, the highest preseason rank in the school’s history.

In the eighth game of the Utes’ nonconference schedule against rivals BYU, Kneepkens took a noncontact fall to the ground with less than two minutes left in the game and exited the court.

It was announced two days later that she would need surgery on her right foot and would be out for the remainder of the season.

“The moment I got hurt, I was just so sad, because I wanted to help my team and be with them physically,” Kneepkens said.

Utah still had an impressive season even without one of the best guards in the country, but its 5-seed and second-round exit in the NCAA Tournament was a far cry from the legitimate Final Four hopes it had in November.

For Utah fans, Kneepkens’ injury has become a great “what-if,” but Kneepkens will be the first to dispel that sentiment.

“I still had so much belief in them. Like those girls were such a good, solid group of girls,” Kneepkens said. “I was never thinking, ‘what if,’ or ‘if only they had me.’ I was just grateful that they still loved me the same and I was still able to be a part of the group, just in a different way.”

The following 2024-25 season was statistically Kneepkens’ best. She averaged 19.3 points per game and was once again first-team all-conference, but in November, longtime Utah coach Roberts left the program to become the head coach for the WNBA’s Los Angeles Sparks.

“That was a crazy day,” said Kneepkens, recalling the moment she found out Roberts was leaving Utah. “It was very unexpected. We had no idea.”

No Pili. No Roberts.

While the program still held many key players from prior seasons and assistant coach Gavin Peterson was promoted to the head coaching role, it was different from the team that was once in contention for a Final Four.

After the season ended, Kneepkens announced her intentions to transfer.

“I was ready for a different challenge in my basketball career,” Kneepkens said. “As I was getting recruited, [UCLA] had a fantastic vision for how I fit in, how they could help develop me and how I could impact the team.”

That vision of her fit in Los Angeles was right.

While she didn’t carry nearly as high a scoring load as she did in Utah the previous season, Kneepkens was one of five senior starters on UCLA’s roster. The Bruins featured a well-balanced scoring attack, with Kneepkens averaging 12.8 points per game. She was one of four UCLA players to average double digits.

In the national championship game, she scored 15 points and dished out four assists.

How does Kneepkens view her college and Utah career?

When asked about her time at Utah, Kneepkens had nothing but positive words to say about her former school.

“I met so many fantastic people in my time at Utah, and they’re still in my life and I’m forever grateful for that,” Kneepkens said. “I’m grateful for my whole experience at Utah.”

Kneepkens said that former Utah teammates Samantha Crispe and Alyssa Blanck were in the stands cheering her on at the Final Four in Phoenix, and that many former teammates and coaches reached out to her, congratulating her on her championship victory.

Overall, Kneepkens’ collegiate accomplishments both at Utah and UCLA are quite impressive. She was a four-time all-conference member, a two-time all-American honorable mention, the Pac-12 freshman of the year in 2022, won two conference titles, and played in four NCAA tournaments. She was one percent away from being a member of the 50-40-90 club in two different seasons.

And now she can add a national champion to the mix.

Perhaps her most impressive accomplishment is being held in such high, historical regard by two separate programs.

“I don’t regret anything that happened throughout my collegiate experience,” Kneepkens said.

Kneepkens will look to continue playing professional basketball and is entering her name into the 2026 WNBA draft.