Gianna Bryant is ‘forever a Husky,’ the Connecticut women’s basketball announced after the tragic 2020 helicopter crash that claimed the 13-year-old’s life, as well as those of her father, Kobe, and seven other individuals.

Now, after UConn beat South Carolina to win the NCAA championship in what would have been Gianna’s freshman season, her mother Vanessa’s mind naturally turned to the girl she lovingly refers to as ‘Gigi.’

‘Gigi would’ve loved being there with you,’ Kobe’s widow wrote on Instagram alongside a graphic congratulating the Huskies on the school’s latest national championship.

She ended the quote with a ‘congratulations’ for coach Geno Auriemma and his fabulously talented Huskies.

Gigi had once dreamed of playing at UConn. Even when UCLA alum and Basketball Hall of Famer Reggie Miller encouraged her father to push her towards the Bruins in 2018, Kobe disappointed his rival by telling him, ‘She is hellbent on going to UConn,’ Arash Markazi revealed at the time. 

Kobe Bryant is seen with his daughter, Gianna, at Barclays Center a month before the crash 

After UConn beat South Carolina in what would have been Gianna’s freshman season, her mother Vanessa’s mind naturally turned to the girl she lovingly refers to as ‘Gigi’

The Connecticut Huskies celebrate after defeating the South Carolina Gamecocks in the 2025 NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament Championship game

UConn star Paige Bueckers was asked about Gigi following Sunday’s win, and she admitted she’d been thinking about the Bryants of late.

‘There have been times this whole weekend and throughout the whole tournament that God has really shown himself and my mom staying in room 824, both of Kobe’s numbers,’ she said. ‘Stuff like that.

‘It’s just been a very blessed year, I mean win or lose, it’s a very blessed year, but I just feel like God’s presence has been really showing out and little things you just see his presence so palpable,’ she continued. ‘I feel like a lot of that too is Kobe’s watching over us, Gigi’s watching over us.’

Inheriting her father’s obsession with basketball, Gigi was a member of Kobe’s Mamba Sports Academy team in 2020 when she was among eight passengers aboard a helicopter headed down the California coast to a game in Newbury Park.

According to authorities, pilot Ara Zobayan became disoriented while flying through a cloud and lost control of the helicopter, resulting in the crash that killed Gigi, Kobe, baseball coach John Altobelli, his wife Keri, and his daughter Alyssa; Sarah Chester and her daughter Payton; basketball coach Christina Mauser, and Zobayan, himself.

Gianna Bryant is ‘forever a Husky,’ the Connecticut women’s basketball announced after the tragic 2020 helicopter crash that claimed the 13-year-old’s life and those of eight others 

Los Angeles Sol player Marta Viera da Silva (L) poses with Kobe and Vanessa Bryant, and their daughters Natalia and Gianna following a game against the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2009

Vanessa Bryant attends the 2024 Baby2Baby Gala at Pacific Design Center on November 9

Several members of that team who were not on the helicopter have since begun their college basketball careers. Northwestern’s Kat Righeimer, Dartmouth’s Annika Jiwani and Princeton’s Emily Eadie are just three of six Mamba Academy players on Division I teams.

‘I grew up going to Catholic school,’ Righeimer told NBC New York. ‘I went to church twice a week, and I prayed a lot, but I don’t remember ever praying as hard as I did that moment. And I remember telling my dad, ‘What does this mean? What are we going to do?’

Righeimer also described what it was like to play with Gigi.

‘She was very bubbly, I can hear her laugh in my head,’ Righeimer said. ‘She was always smiling, always cracking jokes. But on the court, it’s like a light switch. She becomes like a beast.’

Eadie likened Gigi to her father, saying she was ‘just the hardest worker.’