Tennessee Postgame Thread

[oldude]

Some thoughts on the Tennessee game:

• Gone are the days when both UConn & TN were competing for a national championship almost every season. But there is still a lot of magic left in this rivalry, particularly before a big crowd at Thompson-Boling Arena in Knoxville.
• Congratulations to the Lady Vols for getting a true “Statement Win” today over the Huskies. As for UConn, hopefully the team and coaches learned a few things as they have to get better heading into the Big Dance.
• With the news that Ice was out tonight Aubrey had to step up and she did, contributing her best PT of the season so far. In games against really athletic teams, it just feels better to have Aubrey at the 5 over Jana or Ice.
• I felt the keys for UConn tonight would be
  • 1) take care of the ball
  • 2) stay close on the boards
  • 3) make open shots
• UConn won the TO battle 12 to 19, lost the rebound battle badly 34 to 46 and missed a bunch of open shots as well as layups, leading to a hard fought 80-76 loss
• In games played at the speed of tonight’s game, I just think KK has to be on the court at all times.
• It’s back to the BE for matchups against Providence & St Johns, followed by another big test on the road in Columbia, SC. LET’S GO HUSKIES!!!

 

[REB1094]

I guess great effort to only lose by 4. When you miss all your layups, miss all your threes, give up 17 offensive boards, can't stay in front of anyone, and have no rim protection on the road against a top 20 team...most of the time that's a blowout

KK was really fun to watch all game. Sarah got buckets but had a lot of uncharacteristic mistakes including that last foul. Everyone had their moments but Azzi/Paige/Chen/Ashlynn shot 11-37 and it's really hard to win like that

We lost the game in just a few minutes in the third quarter when we were scared and Tennessee took advantage to go up nearly double digits. Couldn't climb all the way back after that

Win against South Carolina and there are no issues. But we've really slowed down against good teams..let's crush Providence and St Johns to build some momentum going into next weekend. Let's go Huskies

 

[EricLA]

Such a sad game. All the excitement over our 3 point shooting lately, this is the reality. And 3 #1 rated high school kids. Ugh.

KK was fun to watch and Sarah, and Aubs at times, but giving up 80 points? yuck. This is not a final 4 team, never mind NC contender. Not at this time, and time is running out.

 

[ec33]

Sad.

 

[yhun89]

One good thing about this was Aubrey looking like Aubrey again.

Desperately need rim protection. Missed layups killed us.

 

[victor64]

I could not believe how easily Tennessee got to the basket.

 

[Barkin Out]

My favorite three seeds were sesame, pumpkin and chia. Now it’s the Huskies. Feel bad Kk won’t get the BA due to the loss. She was great tonight.

 

[JeannoCT]

Playing in the big east hurts us.

 

[ucbart]

This team is allergic to making wide open shots in big games. Because we are a jump shooting team with limited athleticism that can't rebound, we lose. Plain and simple.

I hate to say this, but Paige, and her unwillingness to be an aggressive scorer in the first half of games, is also the reason for this. We were up 39-32 with the ball and threw it away. Geno had some head scratching lineups in there at the end of the half.

 

[oldude]

I could not believe how easily Tennessee got to the basket.

No rim protector for UConn

 

[maple]

We played like garbage tonight. Not going to sugar coat it, sorry. Azzi and especially Paige needed to show up big time and they couldn’t get it done. No excuses. Sarah is a freshman and outplayed them. Not going to cut it.

It’s time for this team to take a good long look in the mirror and figure it out. This poor shooting against good teams needs to stop or we won’t even sniff the FF, maybe not even the E8. It’s not like we had zero chances for layups or wide open looks at 3.

We were winning going into halftime and we squandered it away. That 11-0 run in Q3 killed us. Come on. Get tough already.

Losing to TN makes me want to puke. But I can’t say I’m surprised.

That said, not excited to see all the so-called “fans” come out of the woodwork just to crap all over the players. Laughable.

 

[reelfan]

Soft in the middle and they took great advantage of it.

 

[Bigboote]

Totally in jest:

 

[maple]

Playing in the big east hurts us.

What is your solution, exactly?

 

[msf22b]

It was a good game, a competitive game
They played with more poise down the stretch and won.

The world isn't ending...not yet at least.
I expect we'll play better against SC

This season still reminds me of Stewie's first year

 

[Huskyfan63]

Playing in the big east hurts us.

Not making open shots hurts more, especially when 15 of them are of the 3-point variety. Certainly one common theme of the 3 losses.

 

[ucbart]

Such a sad game. All the excitement over our 3 point shooting lately, this is the reality. And 3 #1 rated high school kids. Ugh.

KK was fun to watch and Sarah, and Aubs at times, but giving up 80 points? yuck. This is not a final 4 team, never mind NC contender. Not at this time, and time is running out.

Couldn't agree more. For years we haven't been able to rebound or stop dribble penetration.

 

[uconn_nyc]

The athleticism of Tennessee, wow! Good to see Griffin back in game shape. We did miss those few minutes Ice provides.

 

[HuskyNan]

Playing in the big east hurts us.

What’s your solution? I’m tired of the complaining when there’s absolutely nothing that can be done about it

 

[Stagnant]

I want to talk about Shade. There is a pattern of these kind of performances when we step up and play better competition. I really don't want to hear that she had a "bounce-back" game if she plays or shoots well against Providence. That simply won't be true. When the announcers/commentators say things like that they are disrespecting the audience.

 

[jmail1]

We lost the game in the first half.
We missed at least five easy layups in the first half.
We need a bonafide center. The ones we have are slow and can not score or rebound.

Our perimeter shooting is not good against good teams.

However we have Aubrey back and she gave us good minutes. There is always hope for improvement and that we get hot tournament time.

 

[Blueballer]

Let the "Chicken Little's" run wild. We lost a game to alowere ranked team. Well we shot poorly especially early. Mix in some uncharacteristic mistakes and that's the recipe for a loss. No need to write off the yet people! Tenn hit big shots late that they had to. Have to credit them. IMO they played better against us than in other recent games as far as shots made.

 

[DEFCONN1]

This was a hard to take loss. If I have to say one thing that stands out to me in this game was this fact the we seemed hesitant on the offensive end. This needs to be addressed and fixed.