University of Connecticut coach Geno Auriemma came, he saw and he crushed USF’s upset hopes.

The future Hall of Fame coach put an exclamation point on his trip to Tampa with an 83-47 rout of South Florida on Tuesday night at the Sun Dome.

It’s the usual for Auriemma.

USF coach Jose Fernandez’s top-ranked scoring offense?

Not a problem.

“We made sure the focal point of our defense was to not allow a lot of open threes, and I think we did a great job of that,” Auriemma said.

Big problem for Fernandez.

At the four-minute mark in the first half, UConn all-American forward Maya Moore had 18 points — the same number of points as the entire USF team.

You have to applaud Auriemma:  Here’s a guy who doesn’t just plan a basketball trip ­— he plans a vacation.

The UConn team arrived in Tampa on Monday afternoon, and the first thing the five-time national champion coach did was take his team to Bern’s Steakhouse.

Oh, and they aren’t leaving today.

In fact, the Huskies will spend the next couple of days on campus. Somehow, Auriemma managed to rent the Sun Dome out for his team to practice in before they leave to play West Virginia on Saturday.

After all, Auriemma owned the Sun Dome on Tuesday night.

At the 6:30 mark, with USF trailing 26-16, Fernandez told senior guard Shantia Grace to “relax” after she turned the ball over.

Grace didn’t get the message. She’s the one who has powered the South Florida Bulls to be the top scoring team in the country.

Grace finished with eight points and seven turnovers.

The facade of the 13-1 non-conference record is beginning to crack with a 0-2 Big East start.

A 68-60 road loss to Marquette and Tuesday night’s debacle were not the way Fernandez wanted to begin his quest for a NCAA Tournament bid. But, to be fair, not many people have or will beat the 2009 UConn Huskies.

That’s because of Auriemma. He’s built a basketball dynasty in Storrs, Conn.

Auriemma has made nine Final Four appearances and won five national championships and 16 Big East regular season titles. The spotlight is always on UConn. Auriemma said, however, that his team is always prepared to handle that pressure.

“I don’t ever want my players going into a game thinking, ‘Oh my God, if we lose this we’ll be on SportsCenter,'” he said. “I just want my team to focus and not get caught up in all that.”

On Tuesday night he made an interesting ­— but effective — comparison:  He compared his team to the New York Yankees — the team that dominated Major League Baseball in the late ’90s and early 2000s.

“Once we got to be really good and were No. 1 in the country over and over and over again, I got to appreciate what the Yankees are,” he said. “I appreciate what it is to be in that environment year after year after year, where the only thing that’s acceptable is winning the World Series.”