Villanova Critical to Men’s NCAA Hopes; Women Go Back to Cali

Last Chance to Impress Against Villanova

The Story: The men’s basketball team will play its final non-conference game of the year tomorrow at Madison Square Garden against Villanova. The Huskies are 0-3 against the three best teams on their schedule, making this game their best and last chance to buttress the NCAA tournament resume.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: This is a big game for UConn and Dan Hurley. It’s true it has lost some luster as Villanova (8-4), the defending national champions, fell out of the top 25 this week after losses to No. 1 Kansas and Penn, but it did beat Florida State earlier in the season. It is No. 28 in the NCAA’s new NET ratings. This remains the Huskies’ most well-regarded non-conference game, so it should be treated as if it’s against a top-25 team. 

NEED A TIER 1 WIN: The NCAA committee is going to use the NET rating instead of the RPI beginning this season to determine who gets in and who sits out. As we talked about on a recent episode of Talkin’ Huskies with Jake Storiale and Katie Sharp, UConn is 0-3 against the top teams it has faced in Iowa (36), Arizona (62) and Florida State (30). Wins over top-30 teams, especially out of conference, will be looked upon favorably, and although UConn beat Syracuse last month, the Orange’s NET rating stands at 73. (The Huskies, meanwhile, are 84th.)

AAC WON’T HELP MUCH: The only other chances UConn will have to get a Tier 1 win are against Houston, currently 10th in the NET rankings, and Cincinnati, which is 25th. After that, only UCF (54), Temple (75) and Tulsa (97) are in the top 100.

The Big East, meanwhile, has nine teams in the top 100 and four teams in the top 50. The American is shaping up as a two-bid league, and that means if the Huskies are going to make an at-large case, they need that non-conference Tier 1 win on their resume. If not, it’s going to take a big run in the American to get into at-large position. The reality is, there is going to be almost no margin for error in the conference or we may be looking at a March with a decent record, a good team and an NIT bid.

WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH VILLANOVA? The Wildcats lost a pair of close games this week after struggling out on the perimeter. They are prolific 3-point shooters: They’re 10th in the country with 352 3-point attempts in 12 games — an average of 29.3 per game — but their 3-point shooting percentage, 33.8, is 199th. Phil Booth leads the Wildcats in scoring with 16.9 points per game and Eric Paschall is second with 14.8 points per game.

“We would rather them coming on being probably overconfident, on a roll, but Villanova is Villanova,” Hurley said. “Their culture is so strong with what they do there. They didn’t lose the last two games because they didn’t play real hard and they weren’t locked in. they just didn’t play as well as they would have like to have played.”

WHAT TO WATCH FOR: This game will be an excellent test for UConn’s perimeter defense, led by Alterique Gilbert and Jalen Adams. Villanova likes to play small, much like UConn, and the Huskies are going to pressure full court and will gladly play a 90-foot game. Will Gilbert, Adams and Christian Vital be able to defend Villanova on the perimeter? That will be the key to the action in what should be an electric game at MSG.

A Golden Opportunity to Bounce Back

The Story: The women’s basketball team will try to get back to its dominant ways tomorrow as it concludes its pre-Christmas road trip with a game at No. 14 California.

SOONERS, LATER: There’s a lot to take away from the top-ranked Huskies’ 72-63 win at sluggish Oklahoma on Wednesday, but the bottom line is that they showed resolve and grit in surviving a 12-point, fourth-quarter deficit.

Their 40.0 shooting percentage was their worst of the season — a surprise, given how bad the Sooners’ defense had been — and they weathered an off night by Katie Lou Samuelson, who scored 20 points but still missed 12 shots.

WEARY LEGS? Geno Auriemma was reluctant to turn to his bench on Wednesday and asked his starters to lift the Huskies out of a hole, with Samuelson, Napheesa Collier and Crystal Dangerfield all playing 40 minutes.

Fatigue is sometimes an overrated storyline in college hoops — many AAU tournaments involve playing at a high level multiple times in a day for several days — but it may be a factor for the Huskies, who have to travel half the country and play one of their most difficult opponents of the season.

BEAR MARKET: The Golden Bears (9-0), a perennial Pac-12 doormat, will be facing the nation’s top-ranked team at home for the first time ever. It’s the second game of a four-year home-and-home series between the two teams, with UConn winning the opener last year by 35 points.

Senior center Kristine Anigwe is the only Division I player to have a double double in every game this season, and she enters tomorrow’s game averaging 23.6 points and 13.7 rebounds. The Huskies have nobody who can match up inside with Anigwe and CJ West, who are both 6-foot-4, or Chen Yue, who is 6-foot-7, so how they attack the boards will be important.

Morning Read https://twitter.com/Talkin_Huskies/status/1075075353645846528

HUSKIES SPREAD CHEER: Men’s basketball players visited fifth-graders at Naylor Elementary School in Hartford and brought gifts and shared advice. (Hartford Courant)

OLLIE SAGA A DISASTER: Mike Anthony writes that there are good people involved on both sides of Kevin Ollie‘s departure from UConn but right now, they’re making each other look terrible. (Hartford Courant)

CLAIM BRINGS SHAME: Mike DiMauro believes Ollie’s allegations of racism “insults every human being in this country who has been victimized by it.” (New London Day)

DAVIS JOINS GT: Former tight end Tyler Davis, who led the Huskies with six touchdown receptions this past season, will play for Georgia Tech as a graduate transfer in 2019. (Atlanta Journal Constitution)

NETS TURN TO NAPIER: Continually undervalued by NBA teams, Shabazz Napier provided a spark off the bench in the Brooklyn Nets’ 96-93 win over the Chicago Bulls on Wednesday. (New York Post)