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Holy Cross Postgame Thread

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Which school has more fans and created more game attendance over this time period? It is, has been, and always will be the UConn way. Be patient...
Your point is spot on, but the answer actually would be Iowa for the last several seasons.;)

Over a greater period, unquestionably it would be UConn.
 
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I attended and then re-watched the game, but I haven't watched Geno's or the players' post game interviews yet.

However, I think many posters in this thread are making the classic mistake of confusing "shooting well" with "playing well". I think that if 50%, rather than 27%, of those shots in the first quarter had fallen (and most of them were good, wide-open shots), UConn would have had a 10-point lead at the end of the first quarter and most of the complainers in this thread would have had nothing to grouch about.

But I see that Geno also said that the first-half play was substandard. He doesn't usually confuse playing well with shooting well, or shooting poorly with playing poorly -- so I have to take his comment seriously. I guess he felt that the first-half defense wasn't disruptive enough, and perhaps he was right -- early in the third quarter, UConn got several steals that led to fast-break points, which never happened in the first half. Holy Cross was obviously trying to slow the pace of the game by using most of the shot clock before they took a shot, and UConn did not create enough pressure on the ball in the first half to prevent them from doing that. In the third quarter, that clearly changed, and perhaps Holy Cross got a bit fatigued.

By the way, can someone tell me (and the rest of the folks here) exactly what defensive mistake Ashlynn made in her first 10 seconds on the court that got her pulled immediately after she entered the game? I rewatched that play, and she did not appear to me to be out of position. She did get caught in a screen, which allowed her opponent to get open for a score, but the usual expectation is that a screen like that will cause a switch, so it would be someone else's responsibility to oppose the shot after Ashlynn was screened. Did Geno think that she should have gone under the screen rather than attempting to get over it? Or was there a communication issue? The play did occur right in front of the UConn bench, so maybe Geno didn't hear Ashlynn make a call that he expected her to make?
JoePgh- - -Ashlynn got pulled for a silly foul she made right after she came in!
Geno blew up and pulled her, but after CD talked to her he put her back in!
 
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The "B" team experiment

UConn led 55-37 with 2 minutes left in the 3rd quarter, and Geno sat the Big 4 -- Paige Azzi Sarah and Ice. The "B" team floundered a little and Paige re-entered in the 4th and you could see the difference she made, not primarily by scoring, but mainly by settling them down on O & D. This is one of the reasons Paige's +/- is always so high. Sarah re-entered a couple minutes later, didn't score at all, but the others seemed to hustle a bit more than the already were. Ice replaced Jana 2 minutes later and scored 6 quick points and energized the rebounding. Allie came in and Paige and Sarah sat down at the 5 minute mark and didn't re-enter. Q came in at the 3 minute mark and Jana and Ice played a two-big set for the rest of the way.

In this 12 minute stretch Morgan and Ash were on the floor the most and both played really well. This is what this installment of the "B" team experiment showed. At least one or another of the "Big 4" has to be out there with the youngsters. But Morgan Ash KK can play well together. They outscored HC 33-15 in this stretch and built the lead to 36 by the end. I hope to see more experiments like this.
Well, I'm a little annoyed with Geno's immature team comment. The reasons?

You hit on it with the "B" team experiment. Geno's putting (almost) random kids on the court and then wonders why they don't execute like a well-oiled machine. You might say they need to be ready to go into the game. Yeah but 1 or 2 at a time not in bunches. That doesn't help team cohesion.

Paige was face-guarded the whole game and had trouble getting free. The 4 other kids on the court were not very effective in helping her get open. Could the random line ups have something to do with this?

In 1Q I don't recall seeing a single switch on defense. UConn always switches. Were they trying something new? They began switching in 2Q.

Late in the game UConn switched to a zone defense. Why, who knows? UConn almost never plays zone. They didn't stay in the zone for long. they switched back to man-to-man.

Bottom line is Geno treated this game as a lab experiment trying different things with different people on the court. Then he calls them immature when the result is less than perfect. Geno, don't blame the kids for 100% of this.
 
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I attended and then re-watched the game, but I haven't watched Geno's or the players' post game interviews yet.

However, I think many posters in this thread are making the classic mistake of confusing "shooting well" with "playing well". I think that if 50%, rather than 27%, of those shots in the first quarter had fallen (and most of them were good, wide-open shots), UConn would have had a 10-point lead at the end of the first quarter and most of the complainers in this thread would have had nothing to grouch about.

But I see that Geno also said that the first-half play was substandard. He doesn't usually confuse playing well with shooting well, or shooting poorly with playing poorly -- so I have to take his comment seriously. I guess he felt that the first-half defense wasn't disruptive enough, and perhaps he was right -- early in the third quarter, UConn got several steals that led to fast-break points, which never happened in the first half. Holy Cross was obviously trying to slow the pace of the game by using most of the shot clock before they took a shot, and UConn did not create enough pressure on the ball in the first half to prevent them from doing that. In the third quarter, that clearly changed, and perhaps Holy Cross got a bit fatigued.

By the way, can someone tell me (and the rest of the folks here) exactly what defensive mistake Ashlynn made in her first 10 seconds on the court that got her pulled immediately after she entered the game? I rewatched that play, and she did not appear to me to be out of position. She did get caught in a screen, which allowed her opponent to get open for a score, but the usual expectation is that a screen like that will cause a switch, so it would be someone else's responsibility to oppose the shot after Ashlynn was screened. Did Geno think that she should have gone under the screen rather than attempting to get over it? Or was there a communication issue? The play did occur right in front of the UConn bench, so maybe Geno didn't hear Ashlynn make a call that he expected her to make?
Thanks for the analysis on Ashlynn. I was going to hunt for a replay to see if perhaps Ash was distracted by receiving instructions from a coach or another player. In real time it looked like she was completely unready for the inbound play. We've seen this before. A player receiving instructions while the rest of the team plays 4 on 5. I didn't realize it was bad pick defense.

An alternate, less likely, theory. Maybe Ash entered the game by mistake and Geno really intended for another player to be in the game. (I've seen the men play 6 on 5 for a few seconds before the 6th guy scooted off the court before a technical could be called. So crazy things do happen.)
 
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Thanks for the analysis on Ashlynn. I was going to hunt for a replay to see if perhaps Ash was distracted by receiving instructions from a coach or another player. In real time it looked like she was completely unready for the inbound play. We've seen this before. A player receiving instructions while the rest of the team plays 4 on 5. I didn't realize it was bad pick defense.

An alternate, less likely, theory. Maybe Ash entered the game by mistake and Geno really intended for another player to be in the game. (I've seen the men play 6 on 5 for a few seconds before the 6th guy scooted off the court before a technical could be called. So crazy things do happen.)
I don't know why Ash was removed, but it did occur immediately after she was called for a personal foul.
 
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I think Sarah’s shot is a little flat, but it works for her.
I did not think that it looked "flat"... I saw a "ROUND" ball go
into a "ROUND" Hoop! "Nothing but net"... always looks good!
 

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I saw a paper in, I think, Nature, around 15-20 years ago, that analyzed the results of thousands of shots in NCAA and NBA games. It found that the optimum shooting percentage arises from a much flatter shot than one would expect. I don’t remember what the number was, but a really high arc was definitely not good.
 
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I saw a paper in, I think, Nature, around 15-20 years ago, that analyzed the results of thousands of shots in NCAA and NBA games. It found that the optimum shooting percentage arises from a much flatter shot than one would expect. I don’t remember what the number was, but a really high arc was definitely not good.
There's an optimum arc for sure, but the higher the arc the more margin of error you are introducing in the trajectory of the ball. I was always amazed at Charde Houston's foul shots. So flat that they didn't look like they would make it over the rim, and she was a very good foul shooter.
 
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I did not think that it looked "flat"... I saw a "ROUND" ball go
into a "ROUND" Hoop! "Nothing but net"... always looks good!
I found that my "flat " vs "round" led to some
unexpected thread follow-ups. My post was just one of my "play on words " thoughts.
But, I found the more researched comments that
followed on the thread rather interesting. Nice to belong to a
BONEYARD!
GO HUSKIES, "FLY" above the "Cardinals", and
then "make stew" out of the IRISH! I know... I made
a "hash" of it... again!
 
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