So much has been made of our stretch of losses mid-season. I’ve heard about Hurley’s Covid, the difficulty of playing in the Big East yada yada Yada…
What I think was at play is as Tristen Newton said in tourney “our second five is as good as our first five.” Let me explain.
After a solid opening to the season with mix of cupcakes, and a challenging tourney with some great competition, a consistent stretch of much tougher games on the road/hostile crowds came up on the schedule, Hurley had to figure out how to get essentially 10 starters to accept their role and figure out how fit in with minutes played.
Frankly, he tried some things that didn’t work - sitting Joey C for long stretches, limiting Clingans time to a few minutes, not going to bench enough - and running into some top 20 teams - that played a role too.
But once the players got into their roles and it was the “we” vs. ’me” we were pretty much unstoppable!
Think about Sanogo’s commitment to the “we” in the tourney vs at the start of the season. I remember one of the first games where he got the ball mid-court on turnover and we had a PG about 10 feet up the court. 999/1000 the center passes that ball, an easy 2.
Sanogo awkwardly decided not to pass and dribbled the length of the court. Danny sat him for awhile after that play.
Fast forward to the tourney and I will make the argument that Sanogo’s performance was the best ever for a UConn player. It was all about the “we” vs the “me” What unselfish and nearly perfect basketball!
I think we lost games mid-season trying to figure out how the pieces go together while playing some awesome competition but IMO too much was made out of us “struggling in the Big East“ but doing fine out of conference. Most teams did not have the problem of having 10 starters - I’ll take that problem and the mid-season losses every day of the week.
Dan Hurley, like his players, made huge strides this year and IMO he is the coach of the year.
What I think was at play is as Tristen Newton said in tourney “our second five is as good as our first five.” Let me explain.
After a solid opening to the season with mix of cupcakes, and a challenging tourney with some great competition, a consistent stretch of much tougher games on the road/hostile crowds came up on the schedule, Hurley had to figure out how to get essentially 10 starters to accept their role and figure out how fit in with minutes played.
Frankly, he tried some things that didn’t work - sitting Joey C for long stretches, limiting Clingans time to a few minutes, not going to bench enough - and running into some top 20 teams - that played a role too.
But once the players got into their roles and it was the “we” vs. ’me” we were pretty much unstoppable!
Think about Sanogo’s commitment to the “we” in the tourney vs at the start of the season. I remember one of the first games where he got the ball mid-court on turnover and we had a PG about 10 feet up the court. 999/1000 the center passes that ball, an easy 2.
Sanogo awkwardly decided not to pass and dribbled the length of the court. Danny sat him for awhile after that play.
Fast forward to the tourney and I will make the argument that Sanogo’s performance was the best ever for a UConn player. It was all about the “we” vs the “me” What unselfish and nearly perfect basketball!
I think we lost games mid-season trying to figure out how the pieces go together while playing some awesome competition but IMO too much was made out of us “struggling in the Big East“ but doing fine out of conference. Most teams did not have the problem of having 10 starters - I’ll take that problem and the mid-season losses every day of the week.
Dan Hurley, like his players, made huge strides this year and IMO he is the coach of the year.