Thoughts about the ND game

[UConnCat]

DePaul made 11 of 37 three-pointers tonight in its win over Illinois State. That's 29.7%. Maybe UConn should study Illinois State's defense and learn how to defend the 3.

 

[TWG236]

I listened to pre-game show and Geno commented on the fact that he would rather play this game with Turner and Reimer playing. He pointed out that by playing four guards, it was going to put a strain on their starters to play defense. I also wondered if Morgan's offense abilities are suffering because of her knee. Her shots seem to be short a lot, which could mean that she isn't able to use her leg to get the same lift that she got last year. Also, Kia is frustrating to watch at times as she continues to attempt to force her way into the paint when there are at least three defenders present. She either gets called for a charge or traveling. What happened to her foul line jump shot. I believe she only attempted and made one midrange shot today.

I also think that because we are only averaging 6.3 three's a game, Geno may decide to move KLS into the starting lineup. As may other posters have mentioned before, it appears that many teams will be playing zone against us. As such, we need someone to be able to make three's to open the defense and KLS has taken over the team lead in three's with nine. But please remember, we have only played six games and although both DePaul and Norte Dame made all those three's, they still lost. Last year we lost to Stamford and it felt like the world had come to an end, but we used that game to improve and I am sure that we will use these two games to point out our need to improve. My guess is by tournament time, we will be a totally different team.

 

[CTBballfan243]

I thought tOSU Football Fans were spoiled!! UConn beat the #3 team in the country by 10 points and still some of you fans are not satisfied. The ND ladies are on scholarship too and some of them are pretty good. In the past two games both DePaul and ND shot a higher 3-point FG percentage than they their season average. Their was a hand in Marina Mabrey's face on a lot of her shots in the 1st half, she just made them tonite. When a teams two top post players are out, why would not pound the ball inside to your NPOY AA? What happened to all that Gabby love from the first couple of games? She's still the same player, with the same athletic ability I've been hearing about since Game 1 of this season. She's still working on aspects of her game and will be fine, so will the team. they haven't even played 10 games yet, calm down folks!!

You think UConn fans are bad now, wait until next year when Stewie and Moriah are gone. The world will come to an end when we (UConn) lose a few games and someone else wins the national championship. This place will be entertaining for sure!!!!!

 

[chrissaran]

HoopsFan21, how would you know how good Natalie Butler is? You don't have a clue. As for Brianna Turner what good is a player who can't stay healthy enough to play? The same shoulder injury two years in a row should be a serious concern to her and to ND.

 

[tower1]

The difference is Turner was a top recruit while Butler has never played a minute for UConn and is not in the same neighborhood as Turner talent wise.

How do you know? She hasn't played a single game yet for Uconn and you come with that conclusion.

 

[Gus Mahler]

Meanderings:

I wish that second spectacular near-tip-in by Stewie had gone in.

Stewie finds herself on the floor a lot.

Allen's a good player and she did OK tonight, but I thought she'd be more of a force.

Mabrey the Younger is pretty big.

I wish Lou hadn't traveled there at the end. A 12-point MOV would've been better than ten. At least they kept their double-digit MOV quasi-streak alive. Aside from the Stanford loss, no one's gotten within single digits of UCONN since the 2013 season.

I wonder if Lou can block shots. Don't think I've seen one yet.

I thought Doris and Dave were tolerable today.

I didn't see much that Collier did wrong today. She had the charge early, which seemed bogus. She fumbled a pass. What else?

Looked like Chong was a little late on a close-out, but beyond that I didn't see much that she did wrong either.

Mo got jobbed on that travel call while colliding with Cable (?). You have to give the offensive player room to make a move.

 

[Gus Mahler]

DePaul made 11 of 37 three-pointers tonight in its win over Illinois State. That's 29.7%. Maybe UConn should study Illinois State's defense and learn how to defend the 3.

Ha! Illinois State won two games last year. Sounds like they've improved a lot.

 

[housekeys]

I've been holding off reaching conclusions about this team until now. ND provided a real test, much more of one than I would have expected, given than they were missing two of their best players. If even one of their bigs had been in this game, I fear for what the result might have been...

Unless ND is allowed to have 6/7 players on the court at the same time, the more likely outcome of Turner playing would be that many of the shot attempts from 3pt (at a 75% clip) would be 2pt attempts (say at a 50% clip). The result being, fewer points by ND. On defense, Turner would have made a difference, so fewer points for UConn. So overall, a push.

Credit to ND and the Mabry's for playing so well today. However, there is no way they can repeat their 3pt shooting again against UConn, and there is no way that freshmen Mabry is better than freshmen KLS or freshmen NC. And yes, UConn's second team will be forced to play ND next year (or whenever they are scheduled to play) and UConn will win that game as well.

 

[HoopsFan21]

Meanderings:

I wish that second spectacular near-tip-in by Stewie had gone in.

Stewie finds herself on the floor a lot.

Allen's a good player and she did OK tonight, but I thought she'd be more of a force.

Mabrey the Younger is pretty big.

I wish Lou hadn't traveled there at the end. A 12-point MOV would've been better than ten. At least they kept their double-digit MOV quasi-streak alive. Aside from the Stanford loss, no one's gotten within single digits of UCONN since the 2013 season.

I wonder if Lou can block shots. Don't think I've seen one yet.

I thought Doris and Dave were tolerable today.

I didn't see much that Collier did wrong today. She had the charge early, which seemed bogus. She fumbled a pass. What else?

Looked like Chong was a little late on a close-out, but beyond that I didn't see much that she did wrong either.

Mo got jobbed on that travel call while colliding with Cable (?). You have to give the offensive player room to make a move.

If KLS is going to be great, she has to emulate Stewie. That means rebounding, posting up, blocking shots, and doing all those other things Stewie does besides drain 3s like it's her job. KLS is still in that mindset of being the best player on the court and not having to "get dirty." Stewie learned and so shall KLS if she wants to make a mark on this vaunted WCBB program.

 

[Kibitzer]

can we stop saying this is the greatest UCONN team ever, we are still undefeated, and let's start taking this season one game at a time instead polishing the NC trophy already.

The persistent hubristic boast that "This UConn team is the greatest wcbb program ever" certainly deserves to be shelved for now. Skip the ceremony.

 

[Sluconn Husky]

Geno not thrilled with KLS's performance:

"The dreaded daily double in basketball," Auriemma said. "As you can see, some of our freshmen are not accustomed to getting in the stance and playing defense.

"I think [Katie Lou Samuelson, who had 10 points] lost 30-10 today. I think she personally lost by 20. If she was in the vicinity, that guy scored. We've got to fix that."

 

[CL82]

This I don't understand. Was it just Geno being stubborn? Once Mabrey2 had 15 points in what seemed like 5 minutes of play, I put my bestest defender on her. And that happens to be Mo. Why wait until after the half to make adjustments? This seems to happen in football as well and I could never understand that strategy. If you see something, say something, er fix something.

I wondered about this as well. My answer: Geno knew after the opening burst that his starters could beat ND. So he brought in the bench players to let them get experience in a high pressure game against a big time opponent. Did you watch Geno on sidelines. No hands through the hair, no looking at the assistants and asking them "what the hell are you teaching them?" He seemed like he felt the game was in control so he let people work through challenges and got valuable tape.

Now maybe I'm just looking through a pair of national flag blue glasses, but that's the way I see it.

 

[CL82]

The persistent hubristic boast that "This UConn team is the greatest wcbb program ever" certainly deserves to be shelved for now. Skip the ceremony.

Agree, Kib. It's too early. I think they have a shot though.

 

[Sluconn Husky]

Credit to ND and the Mabry's for playing so well today. However, there is no way they can repeat their 3pt shooting again against UConn, and there is no way that freshmen Mabry is better than freshmen KLS or freshmen NC. And yes, UConn's second team will be forced to play ND next year (or whenever they are scheduled to play) and UConn will win that game as well.

Statistically, Mabrey's been significantly better than the UConn freshmen thus far.

 

[Gus Mahler]

I wondered about this as well. My answer: Geno knew after the opening burst that his starters could beat ND. So he brought in the bench players to let them get experience in a high pressure game against a bit time opponent. Did you watch Geno on sidelines. No hands through the hair, no looking at the assistants and asking them "what the hell are you teaching them?" He seemed like he was in control so he let people work through challenges and got valuable tape.

Now maybe I'm just looking through a pair of national flag blue glasses, but that's the way I see it.

As long as you see stars in the field when you do, you're good.

 

[wbfree]

Geno not thrilled with KLS's performance:

"The dreaded daily double in basketball," Auriemma said. "As you can see, some of our freshmen are not accustomed to getting in the stance and playing defense.

"I think [Katie Lou Samuelson, who had 10 points] lost 30-10 today. I think she personally lost by 20. If she was in the vicinity, that guy scored. We've got to fix that."

Our perimeter defense needs some work, but it's not just Katie Lou. I guess he can't blame Chong so he has to find someone else to blame. Reality is Tuck can't guard anyone outside the circle, and Kia is not as good as people think she is. She hustles and is tough, but easy to drive by, and doesn't close out on shooters well enough.

 

[uconnfan68]

I thought Geno was out coached for the second game in a row. Other than the switch to put Mo on Mabrey , I saw very few adjustments .....mostly the same old offense. ND kept it close by not only making threes but by moving on offense while our girls were less active. If it were not for Stewie and her all court game, it could have been embarrassing for us.

Ah, but she WAS there, and Geno won again.

 

[uconnever]

I had a few thoughts as I watched the game; can we stop saying this is the greatest UCONN team ever, we really miss KML to break a zone defense, after 2 games in a row where the opponent shows lights out 3s should be a concern, we are still undefeated, and let's start taking this season one game at a time instead polishing the NC trophy already.

Thought the same thing when I heard the media say that this may be geno ' s best team ever........ HUH......they are awesome for sure, but 2002 would take them to the wood shed. This team is flawed....as are most, but I knew how important KML was and that she would be missed. I also think this team could and will grow, and possibly be better all around than last year's team. Also we have alot of slow feet on this team. To me our 3 seniors are good at moving their feet defensively and the rest of our team seem like they r stuck in quicksand.

 

[Jeff H]

So far it seems our biggest problem is not winning by enough. As long as that remains the case I guess we'll be OK.

 

[uconnever]

Maybe he should stop making commercials and work on his coaching.

Maybe you should stop posting, Geno can do whatever he wants. He wasn't out coached either.......we won!

 

[Kibitzer]

Geno knew after the opening burst that his starters could beat ND. So he brought in the bench players to let them get experience in a high pressure game against a bit time opponent. Did you watch Geno on sidelines. No hands through the hair, no looking at the assistants and asking them "what the hell are you teaching them?" He seemed like he was in control so he let people work through challenges and got valuable tape.

You reminded me of something HuskyNan herself taught me many years ago: Geno coaches for March-April, not for the moment in games in November-December-January-February.

 

[UConnCat]

McGraw said after the game that this year's UConn team is better than last year's.

 

[uconnever]

If KLS is going to be great, she has to emulate Stewie. That means rebounding, posting up, blocking shots, and doing all those other things Stewie does besides drain 3s like it's her job. KLS is still in that mindset of being the best player on the court and not having to "get dirty." Stewie learned and so shall KLS if she wants to make a mark on this vaunted WCBB program.

She's should do all of those things, but she's just a different player skill wise. Slow feet and not strong enough to go inside. She will get stronger, but her and Kia just make terrible decisions when driving the ball. I know some here may disagree with me and I'm back and forth on this, but Kia and Lou are not very athletic. Hard work made them into the players they are, they aren't blessed athletic lyrics like some of the other players we have and have had. They are smart and hard working, but they can't jump and have slow feet. After awhile they will just be who they are......with not much growth. All of the girls will grow but their ceiling is lower than say Collier's. ...to me she will continue to get better more visually than Lou or Kia.

 

[JS]

McGraw said after the game that this year's UConn team is better than last year's.

Just makes her victory tonight all the sweeter.

Oh, wait . . . Guess I got a bit too caught up in some of these threads.

 

[JoePgh]

I think that anyone who seriously criticizes an offense that scored 91 points against the #3 team in the country, shot 50+%, and had (I believe) 4 players in double figures, is being silly.

The reason for the low margin of victory in this game was defense. In that respect, this game was very similar to the Stanford game last year, although not as extreme since it did not end in a loss. In the first half, ND scored a lot of points on passes in to players who were free for a layup. Throughout the game, ND's 3-point shooters were getting open looks far more easily than they should have. Fortunately there wasn't too much penetration on dribble drives -- another contrast with the Stanford game.

I was a little surprised that Muffitt benched Marina Mabrey for most of the third quarter after one stupid foul. It made sense to get her out the game at that moment so she could reflect on the stupidity of what she had just done. But (unless she clearly didn't absorb the lesson, which may be the case), I don't understand why she would bench her most effective player while UConn proceeded to gain a double digit lead.

I think Geno was being fair when he basically said that KLS's defense in this game was at about the same level as Saniya's against Stanford. But, as against Stanford, there were lapses in team defense that went beyond one freshman's defensive deficiencies.

It will get corrected, as it was last year.

 

[PhillyCoach]

I thought Geno was out coached for the second game in a row. Other than the switch to put Mo on Mabrey , I saw very few adjustments .....mostly the same old offense. ND kept it close by not only making threes but by moving on offense while our girls were less active. If it were not for Stewie and her all court game, it could have been embarrassing for us.

Hey Gabbyfan - Because in one game players can hit 65% on 3 pt. shots does not make someone a better coach. Last year's Dayton, now DePaul & ND shot the lights out. They all lost. I would say they were out coached. Fired up teams bring Big pressure on UConn--UConn handles the pressure and win by double digits. I think most teams have recruited players and practice most days. They can play BB. The game has to be played. Teams do play over their heads on occasion.
IMHO Geno knows that UConn is struggling while defending and he sits back and watches how the team figures it out for themselves. Notice ND never was ahead by more that 2 pts. or 30 seconds. In early December Geno knows there will be struggles and this gives him more persuasion power to work on specifics in practice. Hey girls (guys), you were struggling--you are not as good as you think--we need to work on this again & again & again. With 10 NC there is a method to his madness.

I think you should evaluate what happens after half-time and during the crucial 3rd quarter. This is wear "game time coaching" is revealed. UConn dominated the 3rd quarter in both games that you refer to. If Geno was out coached as you say---1- who won by double digits? 2-What team busted open both games after getting "coached up" in the locker room? 3-As Uc said & others--the same old offense is a motion offense that has unlimited options & scored 91 points---one can NEVER say "same old" because it was created to be different on each play.
Sorry Mr. Gabbyfan- totally disagree.

 

[donalddoowop]

Thought the same thing when I heard the media say that this may be geno ' s best team ever... HUH.they are awesome for sure, but 2002 would take them to the wood shed. This team is flawed....as are most, but I knew how important KML was and that she would be missed. I also think this team could and will grow, and possibly be better all around than last year's team. Also we have alot of slow feet on this team. To me our 3 seniors are good at moving their feet defensively and the rest of our team seem like they r stuck in quicksand.

UCONN has scored 100, 97, and 91 points in three of their first five games and one of the other two games they won by 30. UCONN does not miss KML's scoring. If they played better defense, none of the games would have been close. Their are people on here who say KML was weak on defense. it's not her offense UCONN is missing, it's her experience. Geno did not make wholesale adjustments in the last two games like he usually does. UCONN is not going to beat all of the good teams by 20 or more points. Too many UCONN fans are spoiled.

 

[UcMiami]

Geno not thrilled with KLS's performance:

"The dreaded daily double in basketball," Auriemma said. "As you can see, some of our freshmen are not accustomed to getting in the stance and playing defense.

"I think [Katie Lou Samuelson, who had 10 points] lost 30-10 today. I think she personally lost by 20. If she was in the vicinity, that guy scored. We've got to fix that."

So it begins - Stewie is no longer the worst defender on god's green earth, but has passed the torch to the new champion! All hail, Lou!

(he must really like her game and her potential to start riding her this early in the season!)

 

[Hongster]

Happy with the win despite ND scrappy play and hot shooting. I just wish Geno left collier in there a little longer, I think Collier is THE frosh to watch, KLS will be good as time goes by but I'm not going to hold my breath on her three to win the game.

 

[Hongster]

She's should do all of those things, but she's just a different player skill wise. Slow feet and not strong enough to go inside. She will get stronger, but her and Kia just make terrible decisions when driving the ball. I know some here may disagree with me and I'm back and forth on this, but Kia and Lou are not very athletic. Hard work made them into the players they are, they aren't blessed athletic lyrics like some of the other players we have and have had. They are smart and hard working, but they can't jump and have slow feet. After awhile they will just be who they are.with not much growth. All of the girls will grow but their ceiling is lower than say Collier's. ...to me she will continue to get better more visually than Lou or Kia.

Exactly!