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UTSA Postgame Thread

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Rusty performance and they’ll get better as competition improves. Very impressed with Shade, Blanca, and Heckel.

Last year it was the big 3 and meager contributions from the rest. Yes, we only have 2 stars this year, but we’re also getting grassroots contributions from 5 or 6 players to help the stars put points on the board.
 
I think things kind of go sideways a bit when the shooting is off. At one point they had missed 9 FT’s and hit only 3-20 something 3’s. Yikes.

Considering Azzi and KK weren’t playing much because of fouls, I guess not bad. Still, UTSA scored almost 40 in the second half. No need of that…..
 
Even though it was expected, I'm glad that we won, were uninjured and, when necessary, dominated (although, only on defense for this game).
The things that were troubling, I think, were puzzling one-offs and anomolies: 3 point and free throw shooting and the lack of game awareness from 2 of our stars (with regard to the foul discipline). I don't expect those things to ever recur (although players and teams can certainly be at the mercy of refereeing vagaries, and teams can certainly have unforced 3 point shooting woes).
On the other hand, UCONN'S defense in the first half was magnificent and, individually, Sarah, Blanca, Ash and K9 did extraordinary things on both sides of the ball (which are likely to be replicated in the future). As an example, I have never seen Blanca be as aggressive and effective on the boards and make patient and well--advised decisions with the ball.
Kudos also to UTSA for never quitting and for taking advantage of 2nd half opportunities when Geno called off the dogs defensively.
On to Monday and either Iowa State or Syracuse.
 
husky98 said:
that killed us? As far as I can tell Geno called off the dogs, UTSA got a little hot. Geno just has no interest in blowing minnows out by 60.
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Did you read both of my posts?
 
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Apart from a slightly slow start and an abysmal 4th quarter with the game out of reach, they played a pretty good 25 minutes with two of their starters on the bench. The end of the bench players were not good today, but the first wave of subs was excellent. The defense was quite good until the 4th.
 
EricSD said:
Underwhelming performance. Expected much better with the time off, and preparation for the tournament. Foul problems for Fudd and KK in the first half, 3 point shooting, and not much more than 20 minutes of really high quality basketball by the team. And you can't blame the performance on the "layoff". Gave up 38 points in the 2nd half. Other 1 and even 2 and some 3 seeds absolutely blew out other teams.

The 2nd quarter was great tho, and on the good side, Blanca seems to be back. Nice stat filling game by Sarah too. Great game by Ash. Solid game by Kayleigh. And for some good stretches, the defense was REALLY elite. But this team needs to be able to put together close to 35 minutes of great basketball to win the NC.

Survive and advance, but boy was it ugly for a lot of the game.
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Good summery of a first ten minutes that was hard to watch. We seem indifferent to offense rebounding when the ball isn't going in. At least Texas gathered a number of offensive rebounds, especially in the second half. Hope our experienced center can finish shots as we get deeper into the tournament.

Some mix of our players pass up good shooting opportunities looking for assists. Then we see turnovers.
Several players of us had an outstanding game. Ash, Blanka, Sarah and Keyleigh filling in well when needed. Our depth was a major strength.
 
hoopsfan22 said:
Why do we even have to have a 2 week layoff? They should have just started everything a week ago. They call it March madness but it doesn't even start until March is almost over and the most important games are in April.
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The madness starts in the conference tournaments.
 
Playing zone with that much time left and the regulars was, in my opinion, not just a case of calling off the dogs. I think the staff thinks that one of their future opponents is vulnerable against the zone.

Whatever the reason, they weren't very good in it. I was surprised by how much they were standing around.

Geno told Rebecca before the game that the team has to be prepared to switch defenses on a spur of the moment.

I love the idea that Geno continues to experiment even during the first round of the tournament.
 
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Look, we are the number one team in the country. And the team is trying to go on a run here. I would assume nitpicking is to be expected.

We gave up more points than I would have liked. I would have liked to have held them in the 30’s. And we scored less. I was hoping we would hang 100 in this game.
 
jaydee602 said:
Syracuse is on pace to be UCONN's next opponent. They lead Iowa State by 15 at halftime.
Audi Crooks has 15 points, but only two other teammates have scored.
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I prefer that. I don’t like the idea of us doing something radically different because we are concerned about how to stop Audi.

That would be bad news for Jana though.
 
victor64 said:
Playing zone with that much time left and the regulars was, in my opinion, not just a case of calling off the dogs. I think the staff thinks that one of their future opponents is vulnerable against the zone.

Whatever the reason, they weren't very good in it. I was surprised by how much they were standing around.

Geno told Rebecca before the game that the team has to be prepared to switch defenses on a spur of the moment.

I love the idea that Geno continues to experiment even during the first round of the tournament.
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I agree. What I saw was that only the starters + K9 played effective zone defense. I’m glad that the staff had the opportunity to sees that sooner rather than later!
 
Kind of expected a game like this, but the good part, we showed our depth!! We got 20 plus from the bench! Plus, our defense. You hear the phrase "defense travels well", we got that down! Great win! Let's go, UConn!!
 
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I watched some of the South Carolina game today, as well as the Huskies game. It was interesting to see the difference in how each team approached similar situations, playing opponents who they would dominate. Once the ball got into the half-court, when an SC player got the ball, they went right at and over whoever was guarding them, often against 2 defenders. There wasn’t much passing or teamwork. Just a lot of one-on-one. It worked fine for them as they had the superior athletes. Don’t know how much that prepares you for when you’re playing a tougher opponent.

A much different story with UConn. They worked as a unit, moving the ball, everyone trying to be in sync with each other. Much more passing. Their style of play remains the same, regardless of the opponent.
 
Dispute starting out with cold shooting, the first half pressure defense overwhelmed UTSA and even before shots started to fall the game was over. UTSA was nowhere near being a team that could compete with a good team no less an elite team.

There were things in the game that can be improved on. Shots not going down for stretches happens to all teams. As long as the shots aren't forced and are within the offensive flow you just keep playing your game and trust shots will start to drop. Missing free throws is less forgivable and can be the difference between a loss or win. Unfortunately not all players make 80 %+ and that seems to be the way of the world. Offensive rebounding has been suspect this year; at this stage of the game it is what it is. I'm not at all worried about how the bench beyond the first nine play. We won't be seeing any of them in a close game.

All in all I'm not a bit more concerned about our NC chances based on this game.
 
EricSD said:
Underwhelming performance. Expected much better with the time off, and preparation for the tournament. Foul problems for Fudd and KK in the first half, 3 point shooting, and not much more than 20 minutes of really high quality basketball by the team. And you can't blame the performance on the "layoff". Gave up 38 points in the 2nd half. Other 1 and even 2 and some 3 seeds absolutely blew out other teams.

The 2nd quarter was great tho, and on the good side, Blanca seems to be back. Nice stat filling game by Sarah too. Great game by Ash. Solid game by Kayleigh. And for some good stretches, the defense was REALLY elite. But this team needs to be able to put together close to 35 minutes of great basketball to win the NC.

Survive and advance, but boy was it ugly for a lot of the game.
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So I would take the position that the layoff did have a negative effect on the team's performance and that is not a surprising development. If they play the same way Monday, I will agree with you but I do not think that will happen. There were a lot of bright spots today and Kayleigh and Blanca had great games off the bench.
 
Stagnant said:
I prefer that. I don’t like the idea of us doing something radically different because we are concerned about how to stop Audi.

That would be bad news for Jana though.
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UCONN would probably employ the same strategy. Let Crooks score 20+ points while stifling the rest of her team. And the Huskies would score at will against a slower Iowa State team.
 
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when you play zone you are basically daring the other team to hit their 3's which UTSA did in the 2nd half. If we had played our usual defense we would have scored over 100 and UTSA would have been left twisting in the wind.

Its good to try different things when you have a comfortable lead.
 
Few Thoughts:
*While clearly all you need to do is win and advance and the game was won by 39 points, is was not a good game for our Huskies...
*First half it seemed like they were shooting too many 3's at a low percentage instead of trying to get in the paint.
*What's up with all the missed layups and poor free throws percentage (in addition to the low 3-point shooting percentage) ...it looked at times as if they never played in this arena before or the height of the baskets was adjusted...
*K9, Blanca and Ash were great.
On to the next game against Syracuse or Iowa St. (which at this point seem to be Syracuse) ...hopefully UConn will play more like the number 1 team in the country.
 
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