We can beat Villanova

[3rdbass]

Marquette still up by 9 with 8 plus minutes. Good thing we didn't have to play against Darryl Morsell.

 

[3rdbass]

Marquette is fun team to watch. They have a lot of people that can beat you one one when you include Prosper. Villanova is down 13 with under 5. This doesn't bode well for us on Saturday.

 

[UncleSpliff]

Villanova goes on crazy cold spurts like us. Could be a serious brick fest on Saturday.

 

[Kitaman]

Any excuse to see my son and go to a UConn game together like we have since he was about 3 months old - just missing Dad.

No chat room Saturday for you, family time.

 

[Kathy]

No chat room Saturday for you, family time.

Absolutely

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Anyone have the over/under on how many times our defenders don’t stay on the ground after being backed down, ball fake and it turns into a foul or a step by and lay in?

The teams that have given trouble to nova on the defensive end have stayed on the ground arms straight up then ready to go get the rebound. I hope they are working on that like crazy the rest of the week. Good chance we will see Samson and Sool if not.

I don’t know… I I watched Marquette dominate Villanova and they sure weren’t staying on the ground with arms straight up on defense.

 

[WeAreUCONN]

These dudes bout to lose 4 or 5 in a row and the ncaa tournament is about to be a pipe dream but ya’ll must be smokers if you believe this team is any good.

 

[Hankster]

I just don't have such confidence right now. But the one thing they have going for them, they're consistently inconsistent

So there's hope

They need their second win and fast. They looked tired Tuesday night. Last game the bench gave us squat. Of course the bench didn't play much. Ville lost last night. They will be hard charging against our boys at their house. Gillespie will get Sonogo in foul trouble. Unless he is nailing threes from way downtown.

 

[Friarsnoop]

At some point it becomes obvious that Villanova is really good, but clearly beatable. Every team in the league has enough talent to win on a given night. Butler is much improved since they've gotten healthy, St. John's has 2 of the best players in the league, and DePaul is talented but not disciplined. Even Georgetown has a top freshman, and enough shooters that could get hot together and surprise someone. What I love about the Big East this year is, like the Big 12, there are no nights off.

 

[Umami Zen]

Shaka creating havoc in the BE.. Fun to see

 

[XLCenterFan]

Great. We get Nova off a loss. I wonder if there's a Nova board out there losing their collective mind like we do here after a loss.

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

When was the last time Nova lost back to back conference games? With the games we have coming up it would have been real nice to win the other night. Not saying it’s impossible buttttt

 

[mauconnfan]

I don’t know… I I watched Marquette dominate Villanova and they sure weren’t staying on the ground with arms straight up on defense.

Oh yeah they were 90% of the back ins they stayed straight up with an occasional off the ball blocked shot but for the most part moved their feet and then turned to rebound the misses.

 

[navery12]

When was the last time Nova lost back to back conference games? With the games we have coming up it would have been real nice to win the other night. Not saying it’s impossible buttttt

They lost to Providence in the final regular season game last year and Georgetown in the opening round of the Big East tournament

 

[navery12]

Great. We get Nova off a loss. I wonder if there's a Nova board out there losing their collective mind like we do here after a loss.

There is and they are. In the 2 minutes of looking at the comments, it's like reading this board after a loss.

- The team sucks and there's no way they're making a run in March.

- The offense sucks and KenPom needs to re-do his model if he thinks Villanova is 6th in offensive efficiency.

- Jay Wright needs to expand his rotation and play more than 6 guys

 

[Huskybass]

It’s time to show we can finally win a game as an underdog. It comes down to coaching adjustments and imposing our will on them. Not the other way around. Does the team on the court cut out the sloppy play and mental mistakes or do we continue the same pattern. Nova is a very disciplined and coached team. They’re going to get mismatches, constant movement, and they’re going to draw fouls.

It seems like the good teams we play always find a way to dictate the style of play and UConn tries to match that rather than dictate pace or style. We won't impose our will until we take a proactive approach rather than a reactive one.

 

[aburks41]

Villanova goes on crazy cold spurts like us. Could be a serious brick fest on Saturday.

They're going to be 13/22 from 3 now because you said that. Thanks

 

[Hungryhusky99]

They lost to Providence in the final regular season game last year and Georgetown in the opening round of the Big East tournament

Yeah without Gillespie lol

 

[aburks41]

The Sanogo matchup could help. They'll have to double him pretty hard. Otherwise he'll abuse their center.

That one loss put our backs against the wall pretty hard. Looking forward to seeing our response.

Seems like every time Sanogo should have a good matchup, Hurley takes him out to go small with the other team. He always lets the better teams dictate the game against us

 

[UConnStats]

Yeah they are the best in the big east with Providence and they have go to player when they need a bucket in Justin Lewis. This can't be overstated because our team doesn't have anyone even close to that.

That really is the problem with this team. We lack shooting touch from top to bottom and we have no isolation scorers.

We have 3 guards on the roster who haven’t developed enough to give us anything,

Jackson/Martin are athletes more than scorers whose touch can vanish in a minute.

Sanogo’s touch has even taken a step back from last year (not saying he hasn’t been better overall, but he’s missing more bunnies).

Cole has gotten even worse at jump shooting too, and the team seems to collectively go cold whenever he is off in a hive-mind type of way. It’s either Polley/Martin/Jackson/Hawkins are all scoring or none of them are.

Not getting a scoring transfer really hurt us. You can brag about our depth all offseason but now JG, Akok, and Hawkins are all bench fodder against good teams, and there is no reliable option at the end of games.

Our defense will let us compete with anyone when we’re scoring, but this is simply the type of team that can go cold and only give you 50 on any night.

I think people have gone overboard criticizing the team the last couple of days. They’re a good, but not great team led by their defense. They just don’t have the offensive chops to take top teams down consistently, and the coaches + players have some sort of the yips after losing so many close games.

 

[navery12]

Yeah without Gillespie lol

Sure, if we want to start adding caveats then we'd have to go all the way back to the year before when they lost 3 straight to Creighton, Butler, Seton Hall

 

[AntG168]

Sure, if we want to start adding caveats then we'd have to go all the way back to the year before when they lost 3 straight to Creighton, Butler, Seton Hall

UConn viewing Nova as the boogeyman is a disgusting development. I hate it for our once proud program

 

[CaptainRon]

This Marquette team is growing by the day. WOW.

This is not the same Marquette team they were earlier in the season.

 

[AntG168]

This is not the same Marquette team they were earlier in the season.

Of course it’s not because we beat them.

 

[PNolanFan]

This team can certainly beat villanova. I say that because we did beat Auburn who is probably the best team in the country