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Message: [QUOTE="JoePgh, post: 2092778, member: 1131"] 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. [/QUOTE]

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