Villanova Postgame Thread | Page 3 | The Boneyard

Villanova Postgame Thread

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Bills Fan said:
Eric, to put your post thoughts into a short summary, at this point our team is not as good as we thought---look at the projected score thread. I'm not saying that we wouldn't win the 13th NC but we won't win it if this is the way we play in the tournament. I do hold out hope!
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Oh puhleeze - why put my post into a short summary when I can use lots of words to say the same thing LOL 😉
 
Glad to take the win!

1. Still struggling in the front court. We barely exceeded them on rebounds. Many baskets missed from very close.
2. Too many turn overs. Need to stay below 10.
3. Perimeter defense fell short. We will face teams who will depend on the luck of 3’s falling to upset us. We need to be a little tighter. They had 11/24 today.
4. Free throw shooting needs to improve.

Lots of homework to close out the regular season. Azzi and Sarah continue to deliver. Ashlyn had a good game.
 
As usual, a lot of good takes from the Boneyard.

For me, it was a Dickens of a fame (A Tale of Two Halves). The first half was about as dreadful as I could've imagined, and the second was much more like a normal UCONN performance.
I thought that Villanova is talented, very well coached and has a star in Bascoe who can score off anyone. The real surprise was Carter playing the game of her life both on offense and defense.
I was stunned by so many of our turnovers. All too often they were on careless passes that didn't take into account a Villanova player being directly in the passing lane (unfortunately, Azzi seemed to be one of the main culprits).
It seemed like UCONN's bench in the first half didn't contribute at all (I had no idea that Allie was even on the court that half, K-9 was having a very rough time and Blana, understandably, was very rusty) with the exception of some good minutes by Jana.
Thank goodness that Ash really asserted herself on offense, to compliment Azzi and Sarah's brilliance.
Azzi shot really well on all levels tonight and Sarah had a remarkable line tonight, augmenting very efficient scoring with 12 rebounds, 4 assists, 5 steals and 3 blocks - only being stifled a bit by, what I feel to be, 2 very questionable foul calls in tge 3rd quarter (how in the world can you be judged to have committed an "undercutting" foul while clearly beating your opponent to a loose ball?).
The great news is that the team regrouped in the second half, remained unbeaten and has a lot to reflect and improve on in their last few games before the Big East playoff gauntlet.
One more note about their turnaround tonight: they wound up outrebounding Villanova on both the defensive and offensive boards.
 
There are positives that come from being tested on the road and winning games when they’re not playing their best. That’s likely to happen at least once during the NCAA tourney en route to a championship.

At the same time, this team can be extremely careless with the ball at times, and that could come back to bite them against stronger opponents if they don’t clean it up before March.
 
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First half - ugh. Azzi summed it up in the post g ame interview.Team was flat. Not communicating. Nova was very aggressive and forced UConn out of its offense. Defense was off.

Second half - outscored Nova 46 - 29. We outrebounded Nova. Got to the free throw line more than Nova. Forced Nova into 26 turnovers.

Nova came out ready for an upset. Give credit were credit is do. Dillion is an excellent coach.

Good to see Blanca back but she was very rusty. Ash had a great game. Jana had some good minutes.

Some things to continue to work on. Geno knows what needs to be done.
 
GetReal2day said:
not saying much.
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True. But look at the +/-. If you give Jana's minutes to Serah, we gain 9 points. Now it is a 23 point win. Still mediocre but not awful.

And it would be nice if we stopped looking like we are running in molasses. There is way too little movement and, when they DO move, it is way too slow. Is it a cold going through the team or the plague?
 
msf22b said:
You can’t see much in the box score
but in the first part of the 3rd quarter, especially when Sarah got her 4th,
Blanca made some good plays on both sides and helped steady the ship.

It’s been a few games now that Kayleigh hasn’t been much help; too bad.
And the Serah story continues…if nothing else, reduces her placement in the draft
(if there is one)…perhaps never was going to be a good fit….Surprised me and surely Geno and the staff…And she doesn’t seem very happy.
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I think that Kayleigh got the most Badass votes in the Marquette game. She only played 10 minutes today; the least of all 9 players.
 
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Azzi had it right. Another game where they came out not ready to play. Seems like they are now bored with the season grind and are ready for post season play. It was painful to watch.
 
I said it last game and I'll say it again - winter doldrums! It used to be a thing where Uconn would go 2-4 games playing really lackluster games, usually the first or second week of January - Christmas was over, classes hadn't starter, cold, bad weather and the energy just wasn't there. Lot of people complaining about KK, but she went 6/1 A/TO on a day when Uconn was throwing the ball away, and a lot of their offense was individual play without assists. She took 6 shots with is pretty standard for her, going 1-3 with 3 2-shot fouls. That she with 33% from the line is not acceptable, maybe she needs to put the mask back on?

Heckel - one of her worst games. Needs to get back to it.

Glad to see Ash putting up 11 shots, she needs to be aggressive in taking shots. Would like to see Allie shoot more.

Do I want more from our bigs, of course, but playing against 5-out offenses is really tough for post players. At least they came up with 50% of our O-boards in a total of 25 floor minutes. Our offense isn't really focused on them, and our post passing aint great.

A week of home cooking and two games against .500 teams will hopefully break the cycle, and then a date at Madison Square Garden to end the season.

NB - I don't care what the NCAA says, LaTech's 54 game streak is bogus - they went undefeated their last year in AIAW for 32-0. Then they started playing in the NCAA and went 22-0 to start their season, before losing their 23 game. That to me is a 22 game NCAA DI winning streak. So, if we win the next three games, we will pass TN and move into a tie with Uconn vintage 2013-15 for the fourth longest streak! and be looking up at Uconn streaks of (70 2001-3), 90 (2008-11), and 111 (2014-17.) Interestingly that 90 game streak is the only one that included two undefeated seasons - the only time that back-to-back undefeated seasons has ever happened in DI.
 
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At the game with good seats. Team Jekyll and Team Hyde. The biggest difference in the second half was intensity and energy on both ends. Villanova is well coached and they knew where the passes were going in the half court offense and disrupted them. It's not an offense that is effective when the set is being run less than energetically. They specifically tried to stop the high post pass to Sarah and had hands in on her whenever she got the ball.

We were just plain flat in the first half and Bascoe had her way with 18 at the half. We were outrebounded in the first half which is just incomprehensible. In the second half, KK did a better job on Bascoe, holding her to 5 until she made a desperation 3 against Kayleigh. Villanova is a much better team than when we played them at home and Bascoe is legit All BE. Can't play that way when it really counts. Even against these BE teams they are not going to just roll over especially when so well prepared and having played us before. Lots of errors and negatives but it's hard to keep up the pace for so long. We have to though. There is no choice.
 
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Okay pretty evident: Strong is irreplaceable but so is Azzi.

I was losing all my doubts on the team when Blanca wasn’t hurt and Allie was playing out of her mind. Now that we’ve seen two games in a row where to the eye test we are not as good in defensely and our bigs and pgs are being outplayed, I have some concern. For some reason KK seems to have dropped off a bit in her defensive intensity and willingness to shoot and K9 is cold and hot. If the bugs cannot dominate in this type of game I would be hard pressed to see them do much against the top teams.

Our bigs have fumbling hands and hold the ball too long before making any moves, which allows the defense to feast.

Today’s game should shed some light into potential problems in the tournament.

1. If Strong gets into foul trouble against the top teams we are in a world of trouble.
2. If Azzi gets into foul trouble or has a horrible shooting night we will be in for a tough night
3. If the refs do not call the physicality because I thought Sarah got fouled multiple times down low and there was definitely very physical play that wasn’t called, it could be an advantage to the bigger more physical top teams like SC. So in this scenario since we are not a free throw heavy team, we need athletes that can are willing to create contact which at this point outside of KK and Sarah we don’t necessarily have those type of hard driving players.
4. Outside of Azzi and Sarah, who can we consistently count on for scoring. It seems Ash, Balnca and Allie would be the candidates, but there’s so much inconsistency right now.

I still have lots of confidence in the team but over the last two games more doubt has creeped back into my mind. I’d love to see them get back to that dominant suffocating D and for those not named Azzi and Sarah to bring a consistency so that opposing teams can’t get away with just focusing on those two.
 
HuskyNan said:
This is going to cause a few comments, I’m guessing

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Too bad, Dan, that a game is four quarters long and the season has been 112 quarters long. Williams had 6 points in the third quarter, not 8. Geno gave Williams zero minutes in the second and fourth quarters.
 
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