UCONN-Creighton Post game thread

[donalddoowop]

The 40 rebound reversal is very hard to comprehend along with the inability to finish inside vs. dominating inside the last game.. I have to think fatigue is a major factor here. I know Creighton doesn't play traditional low post bigs, but with Caroline back, Geno stuck with a 6 player rotation keeping Ayanna on the bench.

That doesn't help much regarding fatigue. Caroline might play more minutes than Ayanna would, particularly in the upcoming games, but with a 6 player rotation your team will be tired period. Considering the benefit that just two or three minutes each half by Ayanna could provide, getting starters minutes maybe just down to the lower 30's, could make them more effective, even if Ayanna's personal production is just mediocre.

Geno must think that Ayanna is unplayable, basically joining Amari and Ines as players who are only included in his gameplan when he has absolutely no choice, or the game has been decided. I pretty much expected that to be the role for Ines, and was not terribly surprised that Amari has not yet earned his trust yet, but with Ayanna it really surprises me.

I can't see what practices are like, but I haven't heard negatives about her approach or effort, and even though she is raw as could be, and makes a ton of mistakes, you can also see potential there. Maybe she would be terrible if he played her more, I don't know. But I think most of us can see with our own eyes that these girls are gassed and running on fumes. It is not the Nika, Lou, Aubrey, Aaliyah and Dorka that we know, instead they are all significantly worse players due to fatigue.

Now with Caroline back for maybe 20-25 minutes a game or so, with another 5-10 from Ayanna you could get the starters to 34-35 minutes a game, and increase the effectiveness of all the starters. It could be Amari instead of Ayanna if Geno thought that would be better option, but at least for minimal minutes, we need a 7th player in the rotation that is a big.

Think about it, a 40 rebound turnaround from plus 32 to minus 8, and our two bigs completely dominated Creighton inside last time, but this game had trouble finishing at the rim. Also remember that bigs don't usually play as many minutes anyway. There are plenty of star bigs that don't even play 30 minutes a game, much less near 40.

The conditioning of our players is remarkable and a testament to them, but there is a limit to everything. I'm not buying the he has no choice argument. There are two big candidates on the bench that may be pretty big disappointments at this stage, at least by Uconn standards, but despite their mistakes I believe they would be starters on most of the division 1 programs. To me that is good enough for one of them to get 5-10 minutes spelling players that have shown over quite a few games, that they are nowhere near their normal production playing the extremely heavy minutes Geno saddles them with.

At least try it, and if that totally fails ok go back to his 6 man rotation, but the 6 player rotation is not working, and hasn't been for some time. You know what they say about trying the same thing over and over and somehow expecting different results. OK I have vented enough for now!

Geno did all that talking about what he wanted from the bench players. Well, he certainly won't see it if he does not play them. Edwards was having a weak offensive game and UConn needed offense. I was hoping he would play DeBerry for she was a threat to give the team some outside scoring.

 

[donalddoowop]

Geno said that Creighton plays basically 5 guards, so Ayanna and Amari would not have been the right subs.

The starters were not getting the job done. The bench could have given them some rest for two or three minutes and I doubt would have done worse.

 

[Tonyc]

Well with Caroline back we are at the start of getting this special group of warriors back on track. Creighton played a different game last nite. They played guards and outside shooters forcing UConns bigs to come out and guard them leaving the middle open. They could beat UConn one on one with dribble drives and pull up jumpers. Creighton hit a bunch of treys too. A good tuff game which will pay dividends down the road.

It appeared to me when I got home and watched the game after it was over that Dorka and Aaliyah both were rushing their shots instead of taking a split second to get the shot off whether it was a dribble drive and then reverse. To many shots close in were missed because we werent close enough and a spin move in the other direction wouldve made for an easier shot. Geno will handle that in practice.

As far as the bench goes. They dont score and we still need scorers. They are inexperienced in a game like this and when its close inexperience can kill you. Geno knows what he's doing and as much as we all know our bigs need a rest Geno feels we dont have the bench he can depend on yet.

Next up Nova. With Caroline back that will help alot. Nova s Molly has been hot with 50 and 39 points the last two games. Shes a hand full and I expect UConns defense to handle her. I dont see her going off at a high percentage. The game is on the road for UConn and Nova at home has always been a tuff task. Maddy and Olsen need to be slowed down and our defense has been great at not fouling out however foul trouble will make us defenseless. Nova beat St Johns by 13 with Maddy going for 39 the other evening. UConn has Caroline back and I expect a really good game with UConn with the height advantage

 

[Jokerman619]

Yes a great comeback, it seems that they have to get behind in scoring to wake up. Which is a little different than the normal. Caroline added some great minutes. And Lou looked more relaxed. Maybe having Caroline on the floor, helped boost her efforts. AE also looked better. And Nika, what can you say, a fighter, team spirit leader. Duhaz just so calm, nice shooting. And Audrey played her heart out. Not as big as the last couple of games. But that's when next woman up mentality. So gutsy win. Look for a great game at Villanova. Also look for another quality win.
Go Huskies.

 

[Maine CTFan]

Yeah sure...
You had 2 bigs in
perhaps the use of two sub bigs wouldn't have upset the applecart.

This is typical Geno behavior; love it or hate it.
I had the feeling that Caroline would be the only sub
So predictable.

In close games not a lot of people tend to play. Creighton only played one person for extended minutes, the other three players played only five minutes each.

 

[Topdawg]

Both teams shot 38% from the field.
When there's such a tight game, an edge in shooting will do it and UConn won at the FT line, hitting 86% of their FT's to 67% for Creighton. For a team that lives and dies from the three, you'd think the FT pct. might be better.

Listen, Lauren Jensen knows pressure: she's the one who drilled the three that knocked out Iowa (at Iowa) in the NCCA's last year (against her former team, no less). So I was amazed how she clanged that first one off the iron. Thought the game was going OT. Tip of the hat to Ducharme for hitting hers.

Here is a deeper look.
1. Your point - Both teams took 58 shots from the field and made 22
2. They had 12 three pointers to our 6. Hence a surplus of 6 points from field goals.
3. They had 8 more turnovers than we did.
4. They had 8 more rebounds which made up for lost possessions from turn overs.
5. They fouled more than we did and we got a surplus of 8 points from free throws.

Hence, we won by 2 points.

Dorka, Aaliyah, and Aubrey took 31 field goal attempts and 6 free throws. They made a 100% of the free throws and scored 27 points. Dorka made the most 3s!

Nika, Lou, and Caroline took 27 field goal attempts and scored 35 points. They made 6 out of 8 free throws.

At the end of the day, this is a team sport and the win is a team win. In a “normal” Uconn game (??), the guards should be taking more shots, the posts should be scoring at a higher percentage and the whole team should be attacking and getting to the line. This has been an unusual year and I am looking forward to positive surprises.

 

[CL82]

I decided to watch the game tonight in bed. I saw the first quarter when UConn was ahead by 6 or 7 going into the second quarter and then I fell asleep. I woke up just when the announcer said UConn wins by two and Geno made a comment about gutting out a win. I went out to tell my wife and she said that it was a good thing that I did not watch that game as I might have had a heart attack. I'll try to watch a replay. I am glad they won and I am glad that Caroline came back and was a clutch player.

New UConn cheer?

U C O ….zzzzzzzzz

 

[CL82]

I just don't understand how 0 minutes were played by Patterson and Deberry when the team clearly needs some fresh bodies.

Geno didn’t feel they would have helped us to win.

You’re welcome.

 

[temery]

This is a post game thread, not a "lets dump on Geno thread."

Stop beating the dead horse. Find something else to talk about.

 

[maple]

Geno didn’t feel they would have helped us to win.

You’re welcome.

Wish I could like this post 100x more.

If these players could genuinely provide good minutes (e.g., scoring, few fouls) CONSISTENTLY, they would be playing more in games. There is no team out there playing their weaker/est players in close games. Even Dawn played a small rotation against us. Why put them out there in a close game like this and set them up for failure? It accomplishes nothing.

 

[BBallF]

Fittingly Nika had 4 of the 9 fouls. That gave her a 4:1 Personal Fouls to turnover ratio!!!

Is there a national statistic for that?

 

[typhaon]

I thought Edwards and Juhasz had pretty bad games around the basket. With the looks they were getting, each normally gets 3 or 4 more buckets.

Team rebounding woes. Tired legs? Bad luck?

Ducharme was clutch in the 4th (even if that call...). Even if she doesn't do that every game, I think it will be huge just to have another player Geno trusts to extend the lineup and lessen the load, a bit, on the others.

 

[hoopsnloops32]

My take on the situation of the last few weeks changed after yesterdays game. It's clear to me that each of the starting 5 had been playing at their 100% best for a month offensively, feeling the pressure to play above their average level, to compensate for the loss of some great offensive players. This is what had them exhausted, the pressure to continue to deliver more each night than they would normally have to to keep winning at a high level. You could see even at the beginning of the game there was some relief in knowing Caroline was on the bench to take some offensive pressure of them. If Azzi ever returns I think you'll see an even higher level of play.

 

[Creature]

I thought that foul on Duscharme (sp?) at the end was missed. I did not think that was a foul. Poor kid at Creighton then misses her free throws.

 

[maple]

I thought that foul on Duscharme (sp?) at the end was missed. I did not think that was a foul. Poor kid at Creighton then misses her free throws.

The Creighton player hit her hand in the act of shooting, as others have pointed out. It was a legitimate foul.

 

[TheGOAT23]

Nika shoots 37.3% from three, after last night. That’s pretty respectable. Her shot was just off last night and she was hardly alone in that. Even Caroline was 1-5 (20%) from three last night. Like I said earlier, they were good shots that just didn’t fall

Exactly! I wanted Nika and Aubrey to keep shooting after their misses because they are decent shooters. It appears that I have more confidence in them than they do. No one was close to them on a couple of sets, but they were looking to pass the ball.

 

[HuskyNan]

The starters were not getting the job done. The bench could have given them some rest for two or three minutes and I doubt would have done worse.

Teams have to play both ends of the court. Ronseik was shut down for the most part - could Amari have played elite defense on an All Big East First Team player?

 

[SARG 2011]

I have come to absolutely love this team. There were a few head scratching moments but just a gutsy display of team ball when in mattered most. After being down 11 they clawed back. Nika was ice cold from 3 this game. She got open at the top, pointed her finger, received the ball and no hesitation swished in a 3. I mean she truly believes she can do anything. Aaliyah had a timely basket, Lou tied the game and got a key stop, Dorka had a key steal, Aubrey played great help defense. Caroline returned and absolutely refused to lose. When something needed to happen someone said I got this and stepped up. Opportunity for another win against a ranked opponent coming up. The team has shown that they will be ready.

 

[Beemer]

Nika shoots 37.3% from three, after last night. That’s pretty respectable. Her shot was just off last night and she was hardly alone in that. Even Caroline was 1-5 (20%) from three last night. Like I said earlier, they were good shots that just didn’t fall

You did see that airball she launched right after she landed on her elbow right? lol

And I give Caroline tons of slack, it was her first game in ages. Loved that dagger she shot just before the half ended, if you were only going to make one 3 that was the one to make!

 

[Bama fan]

We'll have Paige and Azzi back. Let them throw as many rocks as they want because it ain't gonna do them a bit of good.

We thought that this year, too. But it did not turn out that way. Never know>

 

[Bama fan]

I was at the game, and in addition to what has been said thus far, I can offer the following first-person observations:

• During the pregame warmups, I noticed that Caroline seemed to be overly concerned about being hit by a ball shot by a teammate. During warmups, there are about five or six balls being used, and some of them are bound to hit a player under the basket -- it's routine. But Caroline seemed to think it would be the worst thing in the world if one of the balls hit her head -- an understandable reaction, but I thought it would lead to tentativeness in the game. Fortunately, that proved not to be the case.
• During the game, Aaliyah missed numerous shot attempts when she was a couple of feet from the basket. Yes, she was being harassed by the defense, but she is used to that. Her shooting line for the game was 4-for-13. A normal percentage for her would be 7 or 8 for 13. So I am forced to agree that (at least in this respect) she is in a funk. Hopefully she bounces back from it as quickly as Lou did.
• I don't normally agree with the Boneyard caucus that always wants Geno to play the bench more. However, because of Aaliyah's shooting funk in this game and Ayanna's excellent play in the last game against Georgetown, I thought it would have been wise for him to have given Ayanna a few first-half minutes to see if she could be more effective than Aaliyah was in the paint.
• For a similar reason, I thought that at some point Geno would send Ines in for Nika when Nika kept getting dumb fouls. Ines also performed well against Georgetown and might have provided useful relief minutes, especially since Nika wasn't getting a lot of assists. But Nika was scoring well and playing good defense, and Geno's usual practice is to leave core players in the game even when they accumulate 4 fouls if the game is close. They usually don't foul out, and Nika didn't.
• I see that some people here have complained about poor defense by UConn in this game, but I don't agree with that -- except for their swoon at the beginning of the 3rd quarter. For the rest of the game, they were defending quite well on the perimeter, and Creighton showed very little inside offense. UConn's defense forced Creighton to take very long 3-point shots, usually at the end of the shot clock, and a surprising number of those prayer shots went in. But most of those makes were at the beginning of each half when the shooters were rested -- they started missing quite consistently later in each half. Overall, Creighton shot 36% from the arc, right in line with their season average. But they took 33 3-point shot attempts (out of a total of 58 shots), which is an ungodly share of 3's in their total offense, and made 12. If they had shot similarly from 3-point range to what they did in Omaha, the final score would have been similar.
• UConn's defense also caused three or four shot clock violations (turnovers) by Creighton, and I don't believe UConn's offense ever used up the shot clock. That is usually an indication of successful defensive pressure.
• Regarding the foul on Caroline with 4.8 seconds left, I had a good line of vision and I thought it was a good call -- the defender's hand came down on Caroline's hand as she was throwing up a very low-percentage shot. With 20-20 hindsight, the defender should have allowed Caroline to shoot and miss, and then the game would probably have gone to overtime.
• Some of the comparisons in the box score are revealing: UConn outscored Creighton 22-14 in the paint (despite all those misses by Aaliyah and Dorka); UConn had 6 fast-break points to zero by Creighton; UConn won points off turnovers by 14-8; second-chance points were tied 9-9 despite Creighton having 3 more offensive rebounds than UConn. However, UConn did have only 10 bench points from their one bench player, compared to 17 for Creighton.

Some interesting observations. As far as subbing AP for AE because AE was in a shooting funk, why sub out a player who is not shooting well for a player that never shoots period? And at least six of their points in the paint resulted from UConn defenders getting fooled and not guarding a cutter. Unusual defensive lapses throughout the game. AG falling off her girl to help and the ball goes back out for a trey. And AE "helping" Dorka and letting a layup go by her. Strange, but then they turn around and force the shot clock violations you mentioned. Weird game, I'll take the win though.

 

[NC28604]

Did anyone else notice the mis-quote of Geno in the ESPN article?

Ducharme back in style as clutch 4th lifts UConn

UConn guard Caroline Ducharme returned from a 13-game absence and scored 10 points in the fourth, including the game-winning free throws, to lift the Huskies past Creighton.

www.espn.com

 

[Tonyc]

With Caroline on the court last nite you had someone who was not afraid to shoot and who tried to create her own shot. At crunch time she stepped up and took over. Her dribble drive was a great play in that she went right for the basket to try and get an easy score to win the game. When she missed from that close with the ball not even touching the rim I knew she was fouled and the replay proved it. In the 4th qtr when Caroline was taking over it seems Nika and Lou and Aubrey did to. Caroline brought the team confidence by the way she took over showing leadership, and confidence. With Caroline on the floor teams will have to come out and guard her taking pressure off the rest of the team. So many things changed when Caroline was on the floor. Now we continue to wait for Azzi.

 

[LwrcasefaN]

Nika knows all the 4 letter words. I thought she was about to mix it up with the ref on that post call.

 

[oldude]

Nika knows all the 4 letter words. I thought she was about to mix it up with the ref on that post call.

Even better, Nika knows how to curse at the refs in Croatian.

Ref calls a foul on Nika.

Nika - Kurvin sin!
Ref - What did you say?
Nika - I said good call.