Oldude, I tried and failed to send you a PM to thank you for this and your other Boneyard threads, which my 93-year-old father unfailingly enjoys. (Nothing against the rest of you; I read vast portions of the board to him daily, and he marvels at the depth of the analysis.) I see you live in Moreau. I'm ten miles down the road and think your state park is a gem. Thanks again!
Afraid of Competition?
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oldude
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Many thanks to you and your father. My wife and I hike/snowshoe in the park frequently, particularly since we stopped going to the gym over a year ago due to the pandemic.
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For me, a well played tough win over a good opponent (maybe even one picked to beat you) is much more satisfying than a blow out win over an overmatched team. The tough win is certainly affects the blood pressure, but the victory is that much sweeter. The blowout is fun to watch when the team is playing well and you get to see the kids on the end of the bench play (which is always enjoyable), but the result leaves you with a "they had it all the way" meh feeling at the end.
HuskyNan
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The problem is, when UConn wins a tough game by a relatively close margin, there’s a crowd that thinks the lack of a blowout means UConn played horribly and will lose against other good teams, not win a championship, etc. The game vs Baylor is a good example. It was a high quality game by two terrific teams but some people still found players to blame.
MooseJaw
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Some times we need a blowout some times we don't. While I look forward to every game I get worked up over what I feel will be a slobbernocker of a game so much more. A battle, a true war on the court, back and forth elbows, pushing, in your face shots, blocks and big stops. If all that from the team we love doesn't get your blood flowing and anticipation levels elevated I feel for you. Yes I love to watch the beauty of 5 passes without the ball touching the floor and all the attributes UCONN has brought to WCBB. That said, like Nan, I feel that after a close game or in the rare case of a loss there is no place in blaming players. We can bisect and analyze the game share our views without blame.
HuskyNan
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It’s been going on for years now. Winning looked easy for a while and fans got spoiled. They had no idea how extremely difficult it was for players to maintain the high level of play - for a hundred games, years! It just looked so easy.
CocoHusky
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There has never been any meaningful dissection or examination of UCONN WBB that originated from the BY nor will there ever be. Here I'm defining meaningful to be of consequence to the players or coaches.
oldude
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There’s a good exercise that all UConn fans should undertake every now and then. Try to watch a really good team like Stanford, SC, MD, Baylor, etc. in a close game like you watch UConn. What you will observe is the ball getting stuck on offense, bad turnovers, defensive breakdowns, silly fouls and my personal favorite, missed layups.
I know we were all down on Liv for her 0-7 vs Arizona. Imagine how we would all react as SC fans to Boston missing multiple point blank shots that would have beaten UConn and Stanford? Just sayin.
CocoHusky
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I probably would have reacted by saying Liv "should" have made some of those layups & Boston "should" have made those layups and SC "should" have beat UCONN & Stanford and UCONN "could" have beat Arizona. But that probably wouldn't be accepted here- just sayin!
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Well, you do have a point there.
oldude
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Not really my point, but OK.
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Let’s see, a 6’7” center with one decent season behind her whose fitness level has been questioned (rightly or wrongly) by some or a guard that has been touted for two+years now as the greatest shooter to come out of high school in decades (some say, ever) and whose overall game is being favorably compared to the current national player of the year (who is herself the best player to come out since Breanna Stewart.) Nope! I’ll stick with door number two!
Bald Husky
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We are the victims of our own success. The blame can squarely be put on the shoulders of Geno Auriemma. We are in a very unique, awkward situation where Uconn got too good, and our conference (both of them) got too bad. It seems that we cannot play anyone consistently, that is, how should I say it, normal? Everyone in our conference in no match for us, thus we blow them out. Our OOC matches are against the top 15, so they are always tough, and usually fairly close. There is no team in between. We don't have to win by 40 to have a good game, and we can play poorly and win by 40. We have lost the ability to just enjoy the game, not look for perfection, and not to hold every player accountable for their latest performance. Forums such as this is great to discuss our successes, and even to cry in our soup. If I didn't know any better, you would think that we were talking about professionals. As I said, we are the victims of our own success, reaching heights never seen in WBB, so nothing we can do about it except maybe stop and smell the roses and just enjoy what we have and hope that more competitive teams will appear on our schedule in the near future. Too much of a good thing isn't always ideal.
Of course, listen an elite big is nice to have but it is not a requirement for winning in WCBB. We saw an Arizona team come within inches of winning a NC with an elite big nowhere to be found on their roster. UConn has won NC's without an elite big. In the women's game it's about guard play. Geno has put together a guard rotation that if everything goes to plan could win with Heather Buck as their center!
CocoHusky
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That Arizona team lost to a team in Stanford which had a rotation of 3 contribution bigs who will be back in WCBB for at least two more seasons. The last UCONN teams to win without an elite big was 2003=almost 2 decades ago now. Which of the last 4 NCAA champions would you consider as not having an elite big? UCONN 4 guard rotation of Paige, CW, Evina, and Nika was statistically and qualitatively the best foursome in the country last year. UCONN needs better/bigger more impactful post play from the 4 and 5 positions just to keep up.
How does that change the fact that Arizona with no elite big came within inches of winning a NC?. I hope you're not arguing that you need to an elite big to win a NC, because that would mean you have no idea what you're talking about since I gave you examples of such. I don't think Notre Dame in 2018 had an elite big unless you consider Brianna Turner elite for which I don't. There is a difference between contributing and being elite.
WCBB is a guards game if you don't know that go ask somebody. The 3 teams with the most imposing post players this past season were Baylor, So Carolina and Stanford. Two of which as we know won nothing, and Stanford came within inches of losing to a team that had nothing that resemble an elite post.
UConn has potentially a great guard rotation if that comes to fruition they won't need an AA performance from any of their post to win, they would just need to contribute. If they get an AA performance out of AE or ONO that would be great they could still win without that happening.
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You know Geno obsesses over it; otherwise, he and his staff wouldn't have won 11 NCs.
CocoHusky
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In 2018 ND had Jessica Shepard- I would definitely consider her elite. Turner was hurt that season. BTW Turner was also elite.
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No they weren't. They were good - no way elite.
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UCONN has won their titles
With a superstar in Lobo and a tremendous cast.
With the super Bird along with the Super Sveta and Shea along with a ton of extremely talented low post depth.
With Bird/DT and the great Swin and terrific Jones and Tamika.
With DT
With Maya and Tina (and Renee 1 of those years)
With Stewie and her strong class.
Other than the 2 DT years all the other teams had a supreme superstar along with supreme All-American talent. In the last 3 years UCONN has had just one A/A and up until this year only one was elite. Sure that doesn't mean they can't win it all but without the excessive talent they have had in their titles years, they are like everyone else that is very, very, very good.
And in some cases - especially these last 3 years not better than the team that won it all from start to finish (not just counting the Tourney.).
And nearly all those title teams had some trouble (or had an injury help them escape potential trouble) vs other strong teams. That's why we've got to be prepared that more-than-likely next year we're going to have the same. Posters thinking UCONN is going to win every game by double digits and believing without a doubt they are going to win because their talent is just so much head-and-shoulders above the competition - I just don't understand it.
Until UCONN got Paige (after Stewie)- they haven't had the "elite" frosh superstar from the start- and the supporting players whether it be low post players or the guards in big games that were not all-americans have struggled.
***Diana Taurasi and Sue Bird did not play well vs Oklahoma. Overall imo it could be said UCONN was outplayed on the perimeter but won the game because of their inside players. If those two as seniors and sophomores can have a bad game, then so could the UCONN guards.
*** Stewie in the title game vs ND in 14-15 was a phone rebounder and shot blocker but wound up with 8 points and no assists. UCONN is not winning that game without the great defense from MoJeff and tied KML for leading scorer on offense. And that game vs ND went to the wire. In the last 3 years what UCONN team has had near this combination? And this great team was in a wire-to-wire fight?
So we're supposed to assume that next year's team is going to steamroll everyone even though most of our super super teams of the past had some huge struggles? With that said, we can't assume they are going to be much better? In regards to the OP's points, as a fan I'm expecting a couple of games it will come down to a couple of plays.
And at the other end of the spectrum, if Azzi is healthy enough and near what we expect, then you are going to see yet again UCONN completely annihilate some very good teams unless the very good teams they play are "senior/ 5th year loaded."
With a superstar in Lobo and a tremendous cast.
With the super Bird along with the Super Sveta and Shea along with a ton of extremely talented low post depth.
With Bird/DT and the great Swin and terrific Jones and Tamika.
With DT
With Maya and Tina (and Renee 1 of those years)
With Stewie and her strong class.
Other than the 2 DT years all the other teams had a supreme superstar along with supreme All-American talent. In the last 3 years UCONN has had just one A/A and up until this year only one was elite. Sure that doesn't mean they can't win it all but without the excessive talent they have had in their titles years, they are like everyone else that is very, very, very good.
And in some cases - especially these last 3 years not better than the team that won it all from start to finish (not just counting the Tourney.).
And nearly all those title teams had some trouble (or had an injury help them escape potential trouble) vs other strong teams. That's why we've got to be prepared that more-than-likely next year we're going to have the same. Posters thinking UCONN is going to win every game by double digits and believing without a doubt they are going to win because their talent is just so much head-and-shoulders above the competition - I just don't understand it.
Until UCONN got Paige (after Stewie)- they haven't had the "elite" frosh superstar from the start- and the supporting players whether it be low post players or the guards in big games that were not all-americans have struggled.
***Diana Taurasi and Sue Bird did not play well vs Oklahoma. Overall imo it could be said UCONN was outplayed on the perimeter but won the game because of their inside players. If those two as seniors and sophomores can have a bad game, then so could the UCONN guards.
*** Stewie in the title game vs ND in 14-15 was a phone rebounder and shot blocker but wound up with 8 points and no assists. UCONN is not winning that game without the great defense from MoJeff and tied KML for leading scorer on offense. And that game vs ND went to the wire. In the last 3 years what UCONN team has had near this combination? And this great team was in a wire-to-wire fight?
So we're supposed to assume that next year's team is going to steamroll everyone even though most of our super super teams of the past had some huge struggles? With that said, we can't assume they are going to be much better? In regards to the OP's points, as a fan I'm expecting a couple of games it will come down to a couple of plays.
And at the other end of the spectrum, if Azzi is healthy enough and near what we expect, then you are going to see yet again UCONN completely annihilate some very good teams unless the very good teams they play are "senior/ 5th year loaded."
HuskyNan
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But he doesn’t go on and on about it Every.Single.Game.
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That Carolina heat is getting to you!