Huskies Take Out Frustration on Temple
The Story: The four-game losing streak is over as the shorthanded men’s basketball team obliterated Temple 78-63 at Gampel Pavilion. Christian Vital led the Huskies with 15 points.
NO GILBERT, NO SID: The Huskies played with seven scholarship players against Temple as Alterique Gilbert was not with the team for personal reasons and Sid Wilson‘s bruised right knee kept him from playing. Wilson is expected to return soon, but we are worried about the circumstances with Gilbert.
Gilbert is on campus, isn’t injured or sick, wasn’t disciplined and is not with the team? It is highly unusual for a player to just not play in a game if healthy, so perhaps there are things he has to work out with Dan Hurley. Nothing has been easy for Gilbert this year, or for that matter, his career. His grandmother died earlier this month and he hasn’t played well offensively this season. We are sure to find out his status in the coming days. Hurley said he hopes Gilbert will return in a couple of games. That doesn’t sound promising.
YOUNG PUPS DELIVER: Jalen Gaffney made his first start and played a career-high 36 minutes for the Huskies. He didn’t shoot well, going 2 of 10, but had nine points and five assists with only two turnovers. The Huskies played three freshmen with Akok Akok and James Bouknight also starting. Akok had 10 points, four rebounds, and four blocks while Bouknight had 12 points and six rebounds and one massive tomahawk dunk. The shooting isn’t great, but they played hard and that was good enough last night.
VETS REGROUP: We saw signs of life from the two upperclassmen who played as Josh Carlton ended his two-game scoreless streak with 10 points and Vital, who was still mysteriously misfiring shots, was aggressive in other aspects and had 15 points and 10 rebounds. Vital’s inability to knock down shots befuddles us, but no one can question how hard he plays.
CAN’T SHOOT? WHO CARES? Who said you need to shoot at a good percentage to win? UConn shot 35 percent, was an awful 6-of-24 from 3-point range and won easily. The Huskies were up by as many as 24 points in the second half. How does that happen? Playing hard. UConn crushed Temple in the hustle stats with 20 second-chance points, 20 points off turnovers and 22 fastbreak points and went 28-for-30 from the free throw line. That’s how you score 78 points and win easily when you shoot 22-of-62.
WHAT DID HURLEY SAY? “They want to be out there hooping. It’s kind of their time here to lead us into the next chapter of great success in this program. They were jubilant [Tuesday] about getting the chance to start together.”
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE: One of our favorite stats, outside of seeing the 3-point disparity, is the disparity in free throws made. The Huskies outscored the Owls by 15 from the free throw line. For an offensively challenged team, getting cheap points at the foul line is critical to its success.
NEXT UP: UConn will play Memphis, and former recruiting target Precious Achiuwa (but not James Wiseman!) at 1 p.m. on Super Bowl Sunday.
Back to Reality as UConn Faces Cincinnati
The Story: The women’s basketball team is back to reality tonight when it hosts Cincinnati in the first of three consecutive games at Gampel Pavilion (7 p.m., SNY).
LETDOWN? OK, we know the women never let anything down. That’s one thing Geno Auriemma does better than any coach in the country — getting his team ready to play. The letdown is for us. On Monday, the Huskies played on ESPN against some of their great alumni in Breanna Stewart, Sue Bird and others and nearly pulled off an upset of Team USA. Now, they are going to have to play Cincinnati? Granted, the two go back 15 years to the days of the old Big East, and they have that whole Jamelle Elliott saga between then, but the Huskies have not lost to Cincinnati in 21 previous meetings and, oh yeah, still hasn’t lost an AAC game.
FRESHMEN COMING ALONG: The biggest development we see in the last several games is the development of Aubrey Griffin and Anna Makurat. In the last regular-season game, a thrashing of ECU, Griffin played 33 minutes and had 12 points, eight rebounds and five assists. Makurat had an incredible shooting performance with 24 points, all on 3-pointers. That’s a far cry from early in the season when the bench looked unable to produce.
ABOUT CINCINNATI: The Bearcats are led by Ilmar’i Thomas, who averages 20.7 points per game, and guard Antoinette Millet at 16 points per game. Cincinnati is 13-6 and 4-2 in the AAC.
Morning Reads
MORE FROM AN EMOTIONAL NIGHT: Monday’s game against Team USA had so many storylines it took us a day to catch our breath. (Hartford Courant)
LEAN ON EACH OTHER: Team USA might not be Team USA without UConn — and UConn might not be UConn without Team USA. (Hartford Courant)
DAILY CALLER CALLS OUT UCONN: The Daily Caller took a break from impeachment analysis to write an editorial on the 24 football players who are transferring. (Daily Caller)
SHERMINATOR IN THE SUPER BOWL: Anthony Sherman is the working man from North Attleboro, Mass., who went to UConn and now will play in the Super Bowl. (The Sun Chronicle)
