So Geno Always Favors A Short Bench In The NCAA's?

[JoePgh]

It has become a truism on this board that Geno will always shorten his bench to seven or even six players once the NCAA tournament starts. Everyone else is restricted to garbage time, if they see the court at all.

I think that is incorrect. I think he will use as many players as he thinks can help to win the game. The truism is based on recent experience where UConn has indeed had a short bench, with a huge dropoff in talent and experience after the first 6 or 7 players. But in earlier times, that was not the case.

One needn't go back to the Bird and Taurasi years to see that. I just finished watching the 2006 Elite Eight game between UConn and Duke, which the Blue Devils won in overtime by 2 points after Charde Houston missed an open 6-foot jump shot. (She had several open shots in that game and ended up with zero points.) Obviously, there was no garbage time in that game -- every shot and every possession was critical.

But in that game, Geno used 10 members of his 12-player roster: Wilnett Crockett, Barbara Turner, Ann Strother, Nicole Wolff, Charde Houston, Brittany Hunter, Ketia Swanier, Mel Thomas, Kalana Greene, and Renee Montgomery. Only Cassie Kerns and Tahirah Williams did not see the floor. Only Hunter could be said to have insignificant minutes. Wolff played only a couple of minutes, but they were critical -- the last few seconds of regulation and the first couple of minutes of overtime, as a defensive specialist against Abby Waner and Monique Currie. There were no superstars on that Husky team, but there were 10 players of about equal ability, and in a tough game they all got minutes. There was foul trouble (Strother had 4 fouls early in the second half) which contributed somewhat to the use of the bench, but it was also a calculated strategy against a very deep Duke team with many players whose names are still recognizable in WNBA circles.

In the 2017 NCAA tournament, I expect Geno to use a short bench. But that is because this year his bench really is short. Next year, I doubt that he will do the same thing.

 

[augustaTC]

I like the research and it makes sense.

Geno will do whatever he thinks he must do to win. Not so much numbers of players as numbers of players he trusts. Half the battle is being able to adjust on the fly to what the other coach is leaving you or doing to stop you. Geno's game is all about D and transition opportunities which equals a lot of running. If you can spell your best guys for a few minutes, or seat someone with fouls til the half, I have to believe you welcome the opportunity to do it.

Sounds nice & authoritative to say that Geno always does this or that, but about the only commonality I see is that he generally makes pretty good use of whatever assets he has available given the situation the team is in. But I've only been watching since '95 and I did not stay in a Holiday Inn last night.

 

[Huskee11]

I agree with the points made above that Geno will only use players he trusts and that he will do what it takes to win the game at hand.

It is worth noting, though, that in the last 4 UConn Championship games decided by 10 points or less - two Tennessee, one Stanford, one ND - that calculation led him to use only 7 in each of those games.

Most recently, ND, 2015, 63-53, 4 players each played 39 or 40 minutes.

Remains to be seen what he does this year, but at this point not clear he would be comfortable going more than 7 deep.

 

[UcMiami]

Interesting stuff Joe - but that team was a walking mash unit as well. Brittany Hunter unfortunately was never a 'whole' player during her time at UConn and was physically unable to play a minute longer than however many minutes she played in pretty much any game - if she had been physically able Geno would have played her for all 40 minutes of regulation. And by that year Wolff was also walking wounded and never again the player who arrived as a freshman starter (ahead of Maria Conlon, by the way.) And Ann would also have played 40 minutes if she hadn't been in foul trouble as well. So those were two 'starters' that had to be replaced regardless of any standard rotational plan. But yeah, he had sort of a mix and match team that year.

I do think he generally rides his starters longer in the tournament - they play two games in three days and then have five days off before repeating it two more times and they have had ten days off before the start, so he is likely to play starters longer even in the first round blow out to shake off rust and get their rhythm back, and he usually continues that. And as the games get more challenging, even in the regular season, the starters tend to be playing 33-35 minutes as long as fouls and match-ups are going well. The issue is maintaining rhythm, and it is really hard to do that if the too many people are rotating in and out - during the regular season a loss because you lost rhythm and things fell apart isn't a disaster, during the tournaments it is because there isn't another game.

With the Olympics where he had an incredible bench, that was also incredibly experienced, he was able to do group substitutions sort of like line changes of defenders or the front line in hockey so specific pairs or threes of players could develop their own rhythm and consistency. But you saw the team struggle a bit more than usual when Sue missed the game. And in the final knock out games the starters got longer runs I think.

 

[f1f1ferrari]

In the tournament, Geno uses the player he knows he can rely on. If you've been inconsistent, you're not likely to see much floor time. If he has seven players he can rely on, he'll go seven deep. If he has ten, he'll go ten deep. This year, I think he'll go seven deep (Dangerfield, Butler) in the later rounds, maybe eight (Irwin) in the early rounds. I feel Bent has been too inconsistent, which is why she sees less playing time now than she did a few weeks ago.