Dayton Post Game Thread

[Jumpman62114]

Team is so flawed. How the coaching staff mis-evaluated Mahaney and the PG position overall is pretty damning. Defense overall just abysmal. I’ll take 2 nattys and a down year any day but this is a tough pill to swallow. Schedule doesnt get any easier with baylor, texas, gonzaga. Would be lucky to go 1-2 based on what we’ve seen.

 

[Fishy]

Foul discrepancy doesn't explain letting our opponents shoot 50% from the field every night. Hurley and co has Titanic sized holes to plug.

Oh, we’re double threats there.

The other team is going to score whenever they have the ball - we’re either gonna let them score or we’re going to send them to the foul line.

The fouls and the bad D are brothers.

 

[UCONNFAN179]

That was very difficult to watch, but this is still a tournament team. Just one that we should probably be happy to win one game with

I don’t think it’s any certainty that we make the tournament. If I had to bet right now I would say we do not. We severely overestimated our talent. We have shooting, but no athleticism at all

 

[AntG168]

Doubt this was your opinion a month ago.

Another Hurley denier? I’ve got a list going….

No one should be a Hurley denier.

BUT

He’s clearly had a bad few months with putting this team together and coaching them.

 

[connVA]

Until we're able to consistently defend the three and stop the penetration, talking about offense is pointless. Too many times during this tournament have we gotten separation (or tonight just pull closer) only to give it all back and more because we can't get any stops. Thanksgiving homework for DH, Kimani, and Luke.

 

[Icehawk]

Why was Stewart glued to the bench? Ditto Reed?

Johnson looked better, not that that was hard but I am trying find anything positive here.

McNeeley with a friggin donut, wth.

It's not just that we foul, we foul giving them FTs.

 

[UConnSportsGuy]

This will be a test whether Hurley loses this team. There was an awful lot of give up in this game.

Yes, the next two weeks will be very interesting. Things could get very ugly if they don't turn this around.

 

[444JR]

The million interviews with Hurley talking about three-peating was fun but I get the sense from Hurley on down this team loved the smell of their own farts the entire off-season. The sum is shockingly so much less than the parts.

Our defense is atrocious, you simply can't win games with the defense we play. The staff probably should've focused on defense while they were busy perfecting the offense. The offense is also a huge mess but nothing like the D.

Hurley has no clue what his rotation is. He had Mahaney and Nowell playing together. Then at one point he went with no guards. He stressed all off-season and up until today that the strength of the team is our great wings. What does having depth at wing matter when you play Liam the whole time when he's hurt and missing everything and you have Jaylin plastered to the bench. Jaylin gets the short end of the stick every game. He got four seconds of action in the second half and missed a shot before being benched. How dare he miss a shot.

Solo can shoot threes, that's it. He's a huge liability on defense and does nothing other than shoot threes on offense. Hass plays his heart out but he's meant to be a backup point guard/energy guy off the bench. Karaban looks great if he's hitting threes, otherwise he's a ghost. Only thing Samson is good at is alley oops and blocking shots but he usually fouls on his block attempts. Everything else is a liability with him. Jaylin is inexplicably in the doghouse. Ross and Mahaney provide nothing. Where was Tarris Reed?

The last two years were amazing but Hurley probably needed this humble pie. Something miraculous has to happen or this team isn't making the tournament. I'm already at peace with it. I didn't think we would win this game going into it but the way we played leaves a very bad taste.

On to Thanksgiving, enjoy your Turkey and ketchup.

This just about sums it up.

 

[Smp7598]

This will be a test whether Hurley loses this team. There was an awful lot of give up in this game.

I agree,also troublesome everytime a UConn player fouled they would give the ref the look like wtf. Blame Hurley for that!

 

[willie99]

Kids have a lot to learn. Coaching staff has a lot of work to do. They're just as disappointed if not more so than us. I'll be there to encourage their turnaround

And if someone doesn't think a 98 - 48 free throw disparity makes a difference or the inconsistencies are justified, well they can keep on throat punching air.

I'm going to suggest we just witnessed the largest free throw disparity in the history of three game tournaments

 

[How Sway?!]

While I agree with this, they more than earned it after the last 2 years. Let’s not let a rebuild year rewrite history.

Not trying to rewrite anything, agree Hurley and co deserved all the praise and money they got for the back to back. But part of being a top 5 paid coach is the expectation that you will keep having top 15 squads every year and not whatever this is.

Also, you can't really use rebuilding year as an excuse in the portal era. Could easily bring impact players to replace what was lost.

 

[NIT88]

This reminds me of the 21-22 team, which was one of the most fouled teams in the nation and could not defend the perimeter to safe its life.

 

[aceboon]

feels like Hurley decided Jaylin wasn't as good as Solo and JRoss a couple months ago and won't budge from that position despite Jaylin looking like a better player than Ross. I do not understand the lack of minutes for him

 

[DawgEnjoyer]

Doubt this was your opinion a month ago.

Another Hurley denier? I’ve got a list going….

I thought he would be right as he’s been right for a lot of things, but having zero defensive presence at center and no point guard is a fatal flaw of this team

 

[jorge34]

The million interviews with Hurley talking about three-peating was fun but I get the sense from Hurley on down this team loved the smell of their own farts the entire off-season. The sum is shockingly so much less than the parts.

Our defense is atrocious, you simply can't win games with the defense we play. The staff probably should've focused on defense while they were busy perfecting the offense. The offense is also a huge mess but nothing like the D.

Hurley has no clue what his rotation is. He had Mahaney and Nowell playing together. Then at one point he went with no guards. He stressed all off-season and up until today that the strength of the team is our great wings. What does having depth at wing matter when you play Liam the whole time when he's hurt and missing everything and you have Jaylin plastered to the bench. Jaylin gets the short end of the stick every game. He got four seconds of action in the second half and missed a shot before being benched. How dare he miss a shot.

Solo can shoot threes, that's it. He's a huge liability on defense and does nothing other than shoot threes on offense. Hass plays his heart out but he's meant to be a backup point guard/energy guy off the bench. Karaban looks great if he's hitting threes, otherwise he's a ghost. Only thing Samson is good at is alley oops and blocking shots but he usually fouls on his block attempts. Everything else is a liability with him. Jaylin is inexplicably in the doghouse. Ross and Mahaney provide nothing. Where was Tarris Reed?

The last two years were amazing but Hurley probably needed this humble pie. Something miraculous has to happen or this team isn't making the tournament. I'm already at peace with it. I didn't think we would win this game going into it but the way we played leaves a very bad taste.

On to Thanksgiving, enjoy your Turkey and ketchup.

Stewart is not inexplicably in the doghouse. He’s the worst defender on a team already struggling to play defense.

 

[UConnSwag11]

Why was Stewart glued to the bench? Ditto Reed?

Johnson looked better, not that that was hard but I am trying find anything positive here.

McNeeley with a friggin donut, wth.

It's not just that we foul, we foul giving them FTs.

Johnson needs to be glued to the bench. Not Stewart and Reed. Stewart was glued to the bench in the second half against Memphis.

McNeeley is injured I think.

 

[AntG168]

Why was Stewart glued to the bench? Ditto Reed?

Johnson looked better, not that that was hard but I am trying find anything positive here.

McNeeley with a friggin donut, wth.

It's not just that we foul, we foul giving them FTs.

McNeeley is a freshman. It happens.

Solo was abysmal. Alex has to be better.

All in all this falls at the throne of none other than Dan Hurley. All of our issues were classic cases of poor coaching. Idk what they’re working on. This team doesn’t need to master Dan’s elite offensive playbook. They need to learn fundamentals.

 

[ctbro1999]

I'm hoping the lack of proper prep time maybe sorta explains the debacle of the last 2 games. I refuse to believe we are really this bad of a team, but perhaps reality is gonna smash me in the face very soon.

 

[Punkbo]

Uncontested layups
Constant fouling
Open 3s
No offense
No defense

 

[navery12]

feels like Hurley decided Jaylin wasn't as good as Solo and JRoss a couple months ago and won't budge from that position despite Jaylin looking like a better player than Ross. I do not understand the lack of minutes for him

He was getting burned on defense which is probably why. But that's not much of a reason when everybody else is too

 

[3rdbass]

Today was the first day I really concentrated on Ball playing defense. Wow he is a total mess. He never pressures anyone and then when the guy drives he tries to let him go by for the block from behind but fails allowing the guy too much space for a score. He helps on defense when he shouldn't and doesn't get back to cover the man he left. He is just doing everything in like 5th gear. If he wasn't making shots he wouldn't be on the floor.

 

[CTBasketball]

“Never let your persistence and passion turn into stubbornness and ignorance.”

 

[superjohn]

I don’t know how you just leave Reed Jr sitting on the bench while you’re getting absolutely demolished on the boards.

That was even more inexplicable than Jaylin being glued to the bench. I'm used to Jaylin always getting the short end of the stick but benching Reed felt like Hurley forfeited the game.

I have no clue what he's doing with this team.

 

[housekeys]

I think our losses were as much mental as they were skill (or lack thereof) related. We got rattled by the criminally officiated Memphis game, and never recovered. This game, we fouled and sometimes got away with fouls, because we lost our composure. Not saying we don't have physical / talent / line-up issues, but what we saw was not just that.

Composure, confidence, is everything and right now UConn players don't seem to have it.

I still think UConn can fix some of these things and trust that they will.

 

[UConnSwag11]

Stewart is not inexplicably in the doghouse. He’s the worst defender on a team already struggling to play defense.

That’s an objectively false statement.