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Dan Hurley says bench depth will make or break season as UConn men’s basketball practices begin for 2023-24
Backdoor
Hurley feels his group is ahead of where it was last year, before it opened the season with 14 straight wins and went onto its dominant NCAA Tournament run.
He sees returners Alex Karaban, Donovan Clingan and Tristen Newton, along with Rutgers transfer Cam Spencer, as players who could average about 14-16 points per game. “It’s gonna have to be sacrifice with that group and a willingness to let it be someone else’s night,” he said.
“This whole season for us is going to come down to the bench. My best teams always have that depth, you saw how fresh we were in March last year because of the depth. I just think that our starting five is going to be as good as anyone’s, it’s ‘can we get the bench?'”
“The way Solo (Ball played) today, Hass (Diarra) was great and has been really good. Samson looks great, Jayden Ross has just been an incredible surprise, he’s so far ahead of where we thought he’d be. J Stu (Jaylin Stewart) is catching up,” he said. “We’ve got the pieces there to potentially put a bench together if those are the guys coming off the bench, but there’s competition for, you know, I think we played nine guys easily last year and even got 10 in at some points, so there’s roles and opportunity there to be won.”
The Huskies, of course, also have McDonald’s All-American Stephon Castle to work into the fold. Castle is likely competing for the fifth starting spot.
“All our freshmen, they’re gonna play for the most part,” Hurley said. “If they’re not a starter they’re gonna have an opportunity to play impact minutes. The freshmen that are playing impact minutes for us, if they’re not starting this year we’re gonna expect them to start as sophomores. … We have a couple freshmen I imagine are going to be in a similar situation like Jordan (Hawkins) and Andre Jackson (when) they were key players as freshmen and then things opened up.”
Backdoor
Hurley feels his group is ahead of where it was last year, before it opened the season with 14 straight wins and went onto its dominant NCAA Tournament run.
He sees returners Alex Karaban, Donovan Clingan and Tristen Newton, along with Rutgers transfer Cam Spencer, as players who could average about 14-16 points per game. “It’s gonna have to be sacrifice with that group and a willingness to let it be someone else’s night,” he said.
“This whole season for us is going to come down to the bench. My best teams always have that depth, you saw how fresh we were in March last year because of the depth. I just think that our starting five is going to be as good as anyone’s, it’s ‘can we get the bench?'”
“The way Solo (Ball played) today, Hass (Diarra) was great and has been really good. Samson looks great, Jayden Ross has just been an incredible surprise, he’s so far ahead of where we thought he’d be. J Stu (Jaylin Stewart) is catching up,” he said. “We’ve got the pieces there to potentially put a bench together if those are the guys coming off the bench, but there’s competition for, you know, I think we played nine guys easily last year and even got 10 in at some points, so there’s roles and opportunity there to be won.”
The Huskies, of course, also have McDonald’s All-American Stephon Castle to work into the fold. Castle is likely competing for the fifth starting spot.
“All our freshmen, they’re gonna play for the most part,” Hurley said. “If they’re not a starter they’re gonna have an opportunity to play impact minutes. The freshmen that are playing impact minutes for us, if they’re not starting this year we’re gonna expect them to start as sophomores. … We have a couple freshmen I imagine are going to be in a similar situation like Jordan (Hawkins) and Andre Jackson (when) they were key players as freshmen and then things opened up.”
