UCONN VS Duke 1994(Youtube)

[aceboon]

just seen it was uploaded to youtube, divided into several parts, here's pt1 and you can follow along from there. The uploader has a great channel, bunch of classic 90s matchups, the era I grew up on so this is like heaven for me.



fixed link

 

[mauconnfan]

Good stuff...........

"....another star in Cameron, Ricky Price....." How did that work out? And for Parks and Newton...........lol

Great to see Sheffer, KO, Fair, Travis, Hayward and even some Nantumbu

 

[Gurleyman]

I remember that game as Ray's "taking the leap" game to stardom. Donyell was gone and he had to be the man - and Duke couldn't guard him.

Turned out to be a crappy Duke team (the year of Coach K's sabbatical), but we didn't know that at the time.

 

[conn man]

ahhh...it's gone

 

[aceboon]

I think the uploader is working on combining them all into 1 vid, the vid link is now there but its not playable. I see he also has 99 UConn/Zona from the Great 8 matchup

 

[aceboon]

watching this Zona game, I forgot all about the KFree experiment at the 3. Those who want to shoehorn DeAndre back there need to listen to Vitale's words in this game...

 

[Gurleyman]

watching this Zona game, I forgot all about the KFree experiment at the 3. Those who want to shoehorn DeAndre back there need to listen to Vitale's words in this game...

I always thought a lot of the problem with the KFree experiment was that Saunders was a mediocre PF who didn't replace what Free brought there at all (defense, rebounding, hustle). So we ended up significantly downgrading at two positions (Free for Rip, Ed for Free) from the season before, instead of only one. If, say, we had Jeff Adrien to slide into the four instead, we may have had success.

 

[boog204]

I always thought a lot of the problem with the KFree experiment was that Saunders was a mediocre PF who didn't replace what Free brought there at all (defense, rebounding, hustle). So we ended up significantly downgrading at two positions (Free for Rip, Ed for Free) from the season before, instead of only one. If, say, we had Jeff Adrien to slide into the four instead, we may have had success.

It didn't help that KFree, after transfer rumors to go play the 3 somewhere else, was a hideous small forward who was too timid to do anything with the ball. He was afraid to shoot it from deep (he claimed he could) and didn't possess any skills to help the team at that position. Saunders wasn't a great PF, but his presence, in my opinion, had nothing to do with why the "experiment" failed.

 

[mauconnfan]

It didn't help that KFree, after transfer rumors to go play the 3 somewhere else, was a hideous small forward who was too timid to do anything with the ball. He was afraid to shoot it from deep (he claimed he could) and didn't possess any skills to help the team at that position. Saunders wasn't a great PF, but his presence, in my opinion, had nothing to do with why the "experiment" failed.

Actually thought Edmund was a pretty decent player, one that maybe never reached his full potential yet was pretty good nonetheless. And boog has it spot on.......I love KFree and always did but this move he forced upon JC was selfish from my point of view. He was a very nice player at the 4 and had a huge impact on a NC. At the 3 he lessened the teams overall ability in so many ways and they were easy to defend at that point with a 3 who had little handle and couldn't shoot it. In turn that lessened the abilities of so man including Saunders and KEA.........

 

[Gurleyman]

One of my most vivid memories of Saunders (other than the dunk on Loren Woods on the positive side) was watching him cower away from Anthony Glover whenever Glover got the ball in the low block. He was soft. Frustrating player to watch. Alex O reminded me in many ways of Ed, so it is funny seeing Mau have such divergent opinions of the two players.

The other part of the equation was the personnel. We had Jake and Souley at the 5, Ed and Ajou at the 4, and all we had at the three was Doug Wrenn. We gave Wrenn a brief look as a starter at the three and moved Free to the four when we were struggling, but Wrenn proved not ready for anything but Timberlands. If Free at the three wasn't working and we had some sort of viable option to move him back to the four and improve the team (ie Wrenn emerging), JC would have certainly done it. But based on who we had, playing Free at the three was the best way to get our five best guys out there (perhaps we could have gone with a three guard lineup of KEA-Albie-Tony, but that's a really small perimeter, you need a 6-4 or 6-5 guard like Ray Allen to make that work). Free wanted the move, yes, but our personnel also dictated it.

Free also did play some lock down defense on the perimeter against guys like Ron Artest, Shane Battier, and Michael Redd in the 1999 postseason. I honestly can't remember how well he defended out there as a senior, though - that season has faded from memory. Free did end shooting 12-17 from the floor in two NCAA games so at least he ended playing well.

 

[aceboon]

One of my most vivid memories of Saunders (other than the dunk on Loren Woods on the positive side) was watching him cower away from Anthony Glover whenever Glover got the ball in the low block. He was soft. Frustrating player to watch. Alex O reminded me in many ways of Ed, so it is funny seeing Mau have such divergent opinions of the two players.

The other part of the equation was the personnel. We had Jake and Souley at the 5, Ed and Ajou at the 4, and all we had at the three was Doug Wrenn. We gave Wrenn a brief look as a starter at the three and moved Free to the four when we were struggling, but Wrenn proved not ready for anything but Timberlands. If Free at the three wasn't working and we had some sort of viable option to move him back to the four and improve the team (ie Wrenn emerging), JC would have certainly done it. But based on who we had, playing Free at the three was the best way to get our five best guys out there (perhaps we could have gone with a three guard lineup of KEA-Albie-Tony, but that's a really small perimeter, you need a 6-4 or 6-5 guard like Ray Allen to make that work). Free wanted the move, yes, but our personnel also dictated it.

Free also did play some lock down defense on the perimeter against guys like Ron Artest, Shane Battier, and Michael Redd in the 1999 postseason. I honestly can't remember how well he defended out there as a senior, though - that season has faded from memory. Free did end shooting 12-17 from the floor in two NCAA games so at least he ended playing well.

that 3 guard lineup with KEA, Trob, and Mouring would've been fine, we were the #1 team in the country and had 1 loss with AJP, Austrie, and Dyson at the same spots in 09. the biggest issue with going with that lineup would've been the bench depth.

 

[Gurleyman]

that 3 guard lineup with KEA, Trob, and Mouring would've been fine, we were the #1 team in the country and had 1 loss with AJP, Austrie, and Dyson at the same spots in 09. the biggest issue with going with that lineup would've been the bench depth.

Perhaps you're right - I don't think we ever tried that lineup for any significant time. Maybe the logic, and my impressions could be wrong, was that it feels like there was greater size on the wing in college 10 years ago. Guys like Chris Carrawell, Jason Capel, Richie Frahm (Gonzaga), Dunleavy, Lavor Postell, Michael Redd, Rip, Caron, Shumpert, Terrence Morris (Maryland), etc. were your standard three men at 6-6 or 6-7. Nowadays, it's more common to see three guards than a quality 6-7 small forward that can abuse smaller defenders. Or the 6-7 small forward (Gordon Hayward) becomes a stretch four. It feels like we've had trouble with big threes being able to match up with guards (Rudy, Sticks, Roscoe) in recent years moreso than being able to exploit the height edge.

The other thing that helped in 2009 was that Dyson was a good rebounder as a guard. Tony and Albie were below average, and KEA was a non-entity (although he did keep two offensive rebounds alive among the trees to lead to the Rip buzzer-beater vs UW).

 

[mauconnfan]

One of my most vivid memories of Saunders (other than the dunk on Loren Woods on the positive side) was watching him cower away from Anthony Glover whenever Glover got the ball in the low block. He was soft. Frustrating player to watch. Alex O reminded me in many ways of Ed, so it is funny seeing Mau have such divergent opinions of the two players.

The other part of the equation was the personnel. We had Jake and Souley at the 5, Ed and Ajou at the 4, and all we had at the three was Doug Wrenn. We gave Wrenn a brief look as a starter at the three and moved Free to the four when we were struggling, but Wrenn proved not ready for anything but Timberlands. If Free at the three wasn't working and we had some sort of viable option to move him back to the four and improve the team (ie Wrenn emerging), JC would have certainly done it. But based on who we had, playing Free at the three was the best way to get our five best guys out there (perhaps we could have gone with a three guard lineup of KEA-Albie-Tony, but that's a really small perimeter, you need a 6-4 or 6-5 guard like Ray Allen to make that work). Free wanted the move, yes, but our personnel also dictated it.

Free also did play some lock down defense on the perimeter against guys like Ron Artest, Shane Battier, and Michael Redd in the 1999 postseason. I honestly can't remember how well he defended out there as a senior, though - that season has faded from memory. Free did end shooting 12-17 from the floor in two NCAA games so at least he ended playing well.

While I agree on the similarities there is no comparison......one didn't quit on the Huskies!! Edmund actually was more talented than Ao and had great size but wanted to be a wing man too often...so yes there were some frustrations like AO but in the end he remained a Husky so there is no comparison on these 2 Gurley..........He played some very key moments off the bench in many big games. For a guy with an ego like that he did handle the 6th-7th man role pretty well for a majority of his career so he had another 1 up on the "la "........(now that he's in France! )

 

[Gurleyman]

While I agree on the similarities there is no comparison......one didn't quit on the Huskies!! Edmund actually was more talented than Ao and had great size but wanted to be a wing man too often...so yes there were some frustrations like AO but in the end he remained a Husky so there is no comparison on these 2 Gurley..........He played some very key moments off the bench in many big games. For a guy with an ego like that he did handle the 6th-7th man role pretty well for a majority of his career so he had another 1 up on the "la "........(now that he's in France! )

Certainly some fair points. I was thinking purely from the basketball standpoint of not reaching potential and not showing good leadership when we needed it - during his junior year, AO reminded me of Ed a bit with the bad body language, poor leadership, nothing was ever his fault as we struggled, etc. The 2000-01 team also didn't do so good. Albie probably took more of the Boneyard venom that year (and folks were disappointed in Taliek after he came in with hype), but Ed left a lot on the table as the other senior leader as well (and Albie never said boo, so we needed Ed to be our emotional leader). Quit is too strong a word - he maybe got frustrated or disenchanted at times, but I certainly wouldn't say he quit. And obviously he finished his career here, and without any negative comments - although who knows what he might have said if they had Twitter.

 

[Huskies4ever]

Certainly some fair points. I was thinking purely from the basketball standpoint of not reaching potential and not showing good leadership when we needed it - during his junior year, AO reminded me of Ed a bit with the bad body language, poor leadership, nothing was ever his fault as we struggled, etc. The 2000-01 team also didn't do so good. Albie probably took more of the Boneyard venom that year (and folks were disappointed in Taliek after he came in with hype), but Ed left a lot on the table as the other senior leader as well (and Albie never said boo, so we needed Ed to be our emotional leader). Quit is too strong a word - he maybe got frustrated or disenchanted at times, but I certainly wouldn't say he quit. And obviously he finished his career here, and without any negative comments - although who knows what he might have said if they had Twitter.

I remember reading in the paper, that Saunders claimed that he didn't like basketball, so perhaps, he didn't have the passion. Some of these guys get into the sport because they are tall. He also played tennis, and liked that much more.

 

[Drame]

Im in this video.... I was at the Uconn @ UVA game as a freshman at UVA... Under the basket, watched as we demolished my adopted team. Strange to see a fan celebrating so hard for an away team, well thats because its a Uconn fan under there.

 

[Gurleyman]

Im in this video.... I was at the Uconn @ UVA game as a freshman at UVA... Under the basket, watched as we demolished my adopted team. Strange to see a fan celebrating so hard for an away team, well thats because its a Uconn fan under there.

I remember that one. Final was something like 77-36. When I heard that, I thought they gave me a women's score by mistake (this was an era when if you were out of the area and wanted to find out a score, you often had to call a sports hotline).

 

[zls44]

Yes yes yes nevermind all that, can we discuss where Freeman's dunk ranks all-time? That's the key issue here.