Substitution Pattern Against Maryland -- What Can We Infer?

[JoePgh]

Here are three things that I noticed about Geno's substitution pattern against Maryland, focusing on the players nearer to the end of the bench:

1. I think (as some predicted) that Andra has now moved up past Molly on the backcourt depth chart. She entered this game ahead of Molly and played more minutes. To my layman's eyes, she didn't do much to call attention to herself, other than making two 3's that Maryland was happy to give her. But Molly very clearly is still the second guard off the bench -- Mikayla and Lexi are not in the mix except for garbage time.
2. Even with the shortage of front court bodies, Kyla did not get in the game until the 4th quarter. That tells me that despite whatever sophomore leap may have occurred, Geno still does not trust her. He appears to trust her less than Molly, in fact, based on the minutes.
3. And here's the thing that jumped out at me as I was putting my coat on to leave: With perhaps a minute left in the game, Geno pulled Mikayla out of the game and sent Molly back in to replace her. Why would he do that, especially when she had not made any mistakes that were obvious to this layman? She must have been playing "outside the sandbox" in a way that wasn't visible to me, and Geno pulled her to make an emphatic point that this needs to change.

There is a pattern here: Andra and Molly were less highly rated coming out of high school than Mikayla and Lexi, and it is easy to see that they are less athletic than Mikayla and Lexi. Despite being less talented, they seem to have absorbed "the system" much better than their more talented peers, and as a result they are winning in the "tortoise vs. hare" race for floor time.

Actually, I would go further and say that for Mikayla it has to be that kind of a problem, whereas for Lexi it is a different problem -- presumably conditioning. (And for both of them, undoubtedly defensive play is an issue.) However, I'm still a bit puzzled by Lexi's minimal minutes, because in every single game where she has played in the last few minutes, she has made good plays. Today she recovered an offensive rebound and made a difficult pass to the top of the circle to save a possession. In other games, she has taken a charge, drawn a foul on a drive, and made a couple of shots. That is hard to do after sitting for the first 36-38 minutes of game. I can only guess that Geno thinks Lexi should be doing better, and he isn't going to play her until she performs as well as he thinks she can.

 

[HoopsFan21]

I thought Bent got in first. She first went in for the final 3.5 seconds of the 3rd quarter.

 

[Zanzman]

How many turnovers did Molly have today

 

[Carnac]

How many turnovers did Molly have today

The box score had her down for two. It seemed to me she had at least 4. She turned the ball over on back to back possessions, and both of them were cashed in by Maryland.

 

[JoePgh]

How many turnovers did Molly have today

According to the box score, she had 2 TO's in 6 minutes of play. On a per-minute basis, she was as good (um) as Gabby, who had 10 TO's in 30 minutes. I'm not sure what happened to Gabby today -- she was playing her usual excellent game in most ways, but she kept passing the ball to Maryland. Maybe her contact lenses made her color-blind today?

Andra played 14 minutes, more than twice as many as Molly, with 6 points on 2 3's, zero assists, 1 TO, and 1 offensive rebound. Molly had 2 points, 1 assist, and 2 defensive rebounds to go with her 2 turnovers. I noticed that on a couple of fast break chances, Molly resolutely took the ball to the basket herself rather than passing, making 1 of those 2 shots. I'm guessing that Geno has told her that she has to establish herself as a scorer to set up her passing.

 

[Zanzman]

Sorry I don’t feel comfortable with her out there . I’ll actually take Williams game since you compare the 2 cause she does so many other things

 

[NEforceUConn]

Who doesn't like the determination of Molly, but today she did make some dumb TOers.

 

[tower1]

Sorry I don’t feel comfortable with her out there . I’ll actually take Williams game since you compare the 2 cause she does so many other things

I would have Coombs in before Molly. She is a hustler too and is not afraid to take it to the hoop.

 

[Bestiarius]

With Lou out, this was a great, productive game for the Huskies. It gave the bench, mainly Stevens and Megan, guaranteed extended time. It both created pressure to perform, yet reduced it, knowing they would probably not be pulled at the slightest error. It also gave the remainder of the bench additional time against a quality oponent.

 

[Phil]

Who doesn't like the determination of Molly, but today she did make some dumb TOers.

Maybe she was just going with the flow, it seemed to be what all the cool kids were doing.

 

[oldude]

Geno mentioned AEH in his postgame interview, not with any particular point in mind, but from her play today vs Molly in particular, I think she will be getting more opportunities to move into the regular game rotation. Clearly MW is going to be part of the rotation. If Lou as well as Batouly get healthy and are part of the rotation, that's 8 players, not including AEH, Lexi, Coombs, Kyla or Molly, so there is a narrow window over the next few weeks for any other player to gain Geno's confidence.

 

[YellwJcket999]

I'm not reading too much into the substitutions. If there is one thing that we can count on is that freshman will be inconsistent. So their consistent inconsistency will cause the substitution rotation to change. Let's see who gets to play during tourney time (AAC and NCAA).

 

[Gus Mahler]

I thought Bent got in first. She first went in for the final 3.5 seconds of the 3rd quarter.

Andi was already in. She also got complimented by Geno in the presser.

 

[HuskyNan]

I'm not reading too much into the substitutions. If there is one thing that we can count on is that freshman will be inconsistent. So their consistent inconsistency will cause the substitution rotation to change. Let's see who gets to play during tourney time (AAC and NCAA).

Thank you for injecting realistic expectations.

 

[HuskyNan]

I've asked Geno about recruits' ratings and he looked at me like I have two heads. If a girl is rated 1 or 100 or not all all, he doesn't care. If she is the type of kid he wants and she fits into the system, he'll recruit her. And if the kid does what Geno needs her to do, she'll play, rankings be damned.

I'm not sure why I'm seeing so many comments referring to UConn players' rankings and their relative worth to the team. The high school rankings are irrelevant in college.

 

[Monte]

I'm not reading too much into the substitutions. If there is one thing that we can count on is that freshman will be inconsistent. So their consistent inconsistency will cause the substitution rotation to change. Let's see who gets to play during tourney time (AAC and NCAA).

Good post......Let's get a game tied at the end of 3 periods; then, see who Geno puts in.

 

[Kaizen]

We need to give those freshmen more time. Clearly Megan and AEH are ahead of the other two. But they need more playing time to improve and I think only 3 games are not enough to judge their future in UConn. I still think Lexi and Mikayla have good potentials.

 

[chrissaran]

Andra Espinoza-Hunter is less talented than Mikayla Coombes and Lexi Gordon? Andra scored almost 1,000 points in her senior season at Ossining. Hardly lacking talent.

 

[Zorro]

I would infer that Geno intends to let each of the new players get some experience playing with four starters, on the theory that he can tell a lot more about their ability to do what he wants that way, rather than having all the newbies on the floor at the same time, which is generally a totally confused situation. He has the luxury of doing that without really hurting the Huskies' chances of winning.

 

[oldude]

While I don’t necessarily disagree with your comments about Molly & Kyla, I need to point out that many of us, myself included, had similar feelings about Saniya Chong, rated 75th in her class, who was the only recruit for the Huskies after numerous top recruits elected to go elsewhere.

In the end, Saniya proved me and a lot of other Husky fans wrong.

 

[JoePgh]

I've asked Geno about recruits' ratings and he looked at me like I have two heads. If a girl is rated 1 or 100 or not all all, he doesn't care. If she is the type of kid he wants and she fits into the system, he'll recruit her. And if the kid does what Geno needs her to do, she'll play, rankings be damned.

I'm not sure why I'm seeing so many comments referring to UConn players' rankings and their relative worth to the team. The high school rankings are irrelevant in college.

Of course, high school ratings do not prove anything about a player’s “relative worth to the team”. At best, they are a measure of athletic talent — which is a necessary but not sufficient requirement for helping a team like UConn to win basketball games. Ratings don’t measure a player’s motivation, coachability, work ethic, or intelligence — and all of those things are potentially useful in contributing to a team’s success on the basketball court.

My point was that my personal (totally amateur) eye test tells me that both Lexi and Mikayla are more athletically talented than Molly or Andra — and I assume that is what the high school rating pundits saw, which is why they were rated more highly. But at this point in their careers, Molly and especially Andra are making a bigger contribution towards UConn’s success on the court than their more talented teammates. And I think it has to do with all of those qualities (to which one might add “maturity”) that the ratings don’t capture.

That is true today, but it may not be true in the future. If Lexi works herself into shape and if Mikayla comes to understand the offense and defense that she is supposed to play, then their athletic talent will probably move them ahead of Molly and Andra. But that is the future (we hope), not the present.

 

[hoophuskee]

According to the box score, she had 2 TO's in 6 minutes of play. On a per-minute basis, she was as good (um) as Gabby, who had 10 TO's in 30 minutes. I'm not sure what happened to Gabby today -- she was playing her usual excellent game in most ways, but she kept passing the ball to Maryland. Maybe her contact lenses made her color-blind today?

Andra played 14 minutes, more than twice as many as Molly, with 6 points on 2 3's, zero assists, 1 TO, and 1 offensive rebound. Molly had 2 points, 1 assist, and 2 defensive rebounds to go with her 2 turnovers. I noticed that on a couple of fast break chances, Molly resolutely took the ball to the basket herself rather than passing, making 1 of those 2 shots. I'm guessing that Geno has told her that she has to establish herself as a scorer to set up her passing.

In the postage today Geno said he wasn't that concerend with Gabby. He told his team before the game started that they needed to push the ball more because he knew their half court offense would suffer a bit without Lou.

 

[MilfordHusky]

In the All Access program, Geno talks about freshmen. He says, if you don't keep on them early, they develop bad habits and there is no coaching them for the rest of their careers. Some coaches will let freshmen play through their mistakes. Geno is more tolerant if the effort is there, but repeated mistakes and lack of effort are not acceptable. Coach did talk to them recently and told them to be patient, which I think was a wise move. It's a long season, and there is lots of time to grow. The newbies will get a break in April and get caught up. Look at Crystal's sophomore leap--and Lou's and Pheesa's. They are trying to keep their heads above water now, but they will learn to swim. Some will master the 400 IM.

 

[TitleTown]

Good post.Let's get a game tied at the end of 3 periods; then, see who Geno puts in.

If a game is tied at the end of 3 periods the ONLY people(barring injury or foul trouble) seeing the floor are the 5 starters and Stevens.