UConn stats... small & young has worked for Geno...

[DavidinNaples]

On December 4th, UConn had a record of 4-3 and a bench full of injured players. Geno made the move to go small & young, starting KK and Ashlynn along side his 3 Seniors, Nika, Paige and Aaliyah. Since that decision, the Huskies are 29-2 and getting ready to take on Iowa in the Final Four. I guess Geno can still coach...

With 3:05 left in the 3rd period against USC, Nika was called for her 4th foul. In the next 13 minutes of play, Nika had 4 assists, 3 rebounds, 2 steals and scored 3 points from the free throw line. She had 0 fouls and 0 turnovers. Smart play from the Croatian Sensation...!!

Small & young lineup has worked for Geno, but his 3 Seniors won the game against USC. Paige, Nika and Aaliyah scored 60 of the team's 80 points, handed out 15 of the 17 assists, grabbed 22 of 42 rebounds and 5 of the 6 steals. All three played 40 minutes each...

Southern Cal out-shot UConn 70 to 58 Monday. But the Huskies defense forced many bad shots and USC missed 47 of their attempts. That's a 32.9% success rate. UConn shot 48.3% from the field overall and 46.7% from three range (7-15). Nika, Ice, Q and Ash each made a three to go with Paige's 3 threes.

Ashlynn now has scored 414 points on the season. KK has added 333 points. The are shooting a combined 47.2% from the field (287-608). I'm guessing no one had those two starting 32 games each on their Bingo card.

There's five stats in honor of #5 on the Huskies. The best player in Women's College Basketball.
Go Huskies..!!

 

[BRS24]

Running averages of PPG for, against, and differential. Red line is when Geno went to the small ball lineup. It made huge difference in all the running averages, as although scoring in the tourney tends to get tighter as teams progress, it still shows we're keeping the differential fairly consistent. Second pic is a heat map of the running averages.

 

[Huskee11]

With 3:05 left in the 3rd period against USC, Nika was called for her 4th foul. In the next 13 minutes of play, Nika had 4 assists, 3 rebounds, 2 steals and scored 3 points from the free throw line. She had 0 fouls and 0 turnovers. Smart play from the Croatian Sensation...!!

Once again Nika showed up at crunch time in ways that almost go unnoticed.

It was tied at 59 with about seven and a half minutes left and I'm sure she was tired at that point. But she:

1. made a drive and kick to Brady that got us up two;

2. an offensive rebound off a Paige miss, sprawling to the floor, picked up a foul on Watkins in the process;

3. an assist to Paige on the inbounds, then another assist on a Paige three-pointer, with that little screen at the top of the key. (That has been called an offensive foul on her before, I was holding my breath waiting for a whistle);

4. what I think was the dagger, an assist to Aaliyah that led to a three point play, getting us up nine 73-64 with 2:30 left. It is worth looking at that play closely if you can. Paige rebounds a miss and SC falls back into what looks like a three quarter court zone press. Paige lobs it to Nika on the left around midcourt. Nika instinctively recognizes that she actually has a four on three situation and immediately drives hard to the right, and approaching the three point line at the top of the key hits a cutting Aaliyah who is unaccounted for by the defense with a perfect pass. The defender gets there late, Aaliyah takes it hard to the hoop, and it results in a three point play.

5. a defensive rebound; and

5. a steal and free throw.

At that point is was 76-64, game essentially over.

Winning players make winning plays. Paige scored nine points during that stretch and Aaliyah five, but Nika's fingerprints were all over that six minute stretch as well.