I'm pretty sure that during Corny's time at UConn we had a winning record against Georgetown. We swept them one year in BE play and split the other two. During the first three years of the BE there were six (five in year one, then Nova joined) schools that were all good enough to compete in the (then) NCAA tournament and be ranked (we were ranked at some point in each of those seasons) and two schools (SH & PC) as doormats (sadly we joined that level then they moved above that level). In 1982 we were the last team to beat Georgetown before the national title game. When we had Corny, McKay, Aleksinas (Kuczenski & Bailey as subs) our frontline was as talented as any. We had the talent to compete with anyone in the BE then, we didn't have the conditioning, preparation or in game coaching. Once the three graduated we were done. the 1982-1983 team was somewhat competitive (in comparison to later Perno squads) but we couldn't hang with the better schools in the conference.
I still remember those days and the worst part of it was the small mindedness that too many had. A large portion of the fan base and a good amount of the press saw Perno as someone who could do no wrong. He was the kid who stole the ball from Bill Bradley, sealing the sweet win against Princeton, so he would always be a hero. The argument was UConn couldn't reasonably compete with the better schools in the BE and many proposed leaving the conference for a level where we compete (I despised this mentality and thank God they didn't get their way). They also had excuses as the why we could never compete: 1) top players wanted to play in city schools (which the remainder of the BE was), we could never get them to UConn At the time, a lot of the better programs outside of the BE were similar in location to UConn so this excuse didn't carry a lot of weight and 2) there isn't enough local talent to support a successful program When this was being thrown around, BC made an elite eight (lost to Houston) with four starters from Connecticut. The same year, Villanova also made the elite eight with their best player being from Connecticut (a few years they would win a title with two starters from here). St John's was a tournament team with a starter from Connecticut and one of the top recruits in the country (who ended up at Pitt) was also from here. The excuses were just that, excuses, a means to absolve Perno of his coaching shortcomings. JC stating "It's doable" was among a handful of greatest statements any leader ever said.
When losing to the top of the conference by 20+ points was standard fare, the idea of building a program that would make the tournament four to five times a decade and win a game in the tournament here and there was a reasonable top level goal. If someone went around saying "we're on a path where we'll be tied in national championships with Indiana, behind only UCLA, Kentucky and North Carolina" back then they'd be viewed the way someone would be today if they were to say "we're on a path to have more football championships than Georgia and Florida St". The idea was that absurd in the mid 1980's.
