Martin Goes Nuclear in Second Half
The Story: Tyrese Martin exploded for a career-high 27 points, with all but two coming in the second half, as the men’s basketball team overwhelmed Butler 75-56 last night in Indianapolis.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: Martin was 0-for-4 in the waning moments of the first half when he hit a very tough jumper in the lane to cut Butler’s lead to 28-24. We were wondering if the late start, familiar opponent or gremlins had gotten into the Huskies’ heads. Martin just absolutely exploded in the second half by shooting 10-of-13 and turning a nightmare game into a career performance.
•The Huskies are 13-4, and 4-2 in the Big East, with a date against struggling Georgetown on Tuesday. • That’s not bad for Martin, who was slumping coming into the game and had a sit down with Dan Hurley about his play.
WHAT DID HURLEY SAY? “I like the fact he didn’t have a great first half and put it behind him. He wanted the ball and was very decisive. He looked like a confident guy that was firing tonight.”
SECOND-HALF EXPLOSION: How good was UConn in the second half? Consider the following:
• The Huskies scored 51 points by shooting 18 of 27 to pull a grinding stinker into a rout.
•UConn forced 12 turnovers, scored 10 points off them and crashed the glass for eight second-chance points.
•The advanced analytics are incredible as the Huskies scored on 75 percent of their possessions and averaged 1.6 points per possession in the second half.
HOW GOOD WAS MARTIN? OK. Let’s talk some history. There have been some great single-half performances in UConn history, including Caron Butler‘s 26 second-half points in his final game, an Elite Eight loss to eventual national champion Maryland, the gold standard.
•How about Tyler Polley‘s 23 second-half points last year against Marquette, which started the hot sauce craze that swept UConn fandom?
• Martin’s 25 in the second half probably tops Polley’s 23 as far as impressive performances go.
BOUNCE-BACK GAME: Isaiah Whaley bounced back from his goose egg Tuesday (he had zero points and zero rebounds!) with 11 points and 10 rebounds. The Huskies dominated in the paint, as expected, with Adama Sanogo adding 15 points and nine rebounds. UConn scored 34 points in the paint.
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE: Butler doesn’t play very fast, and despite the Huskies pushing the pace, the Bulldogs had only two fastbreak points. Defensively, UConn held Butler to 4-of-19 from 3-point range and under 40 percent overall. Butler turned the ball over 12 times and only had eight assists.
FIRST-HALF DOLDRUMS: Having trouble sleeping? Just rewatch that first half. UConn scored 24 points and missed a host of shots. It shot under 30 percent at 10-for-3.
• Martin (1-5), R.J. Cole (0-for-5) and Andre Jackson (0-for-6) combined to go 1-for-16 in the opening 20 minutes. Add in Polley’s 1-for-6 performance and that’s how you get one of the worst halves of offense we have seen this year. Cole, Jackson and Polley never got out of their funk. Luckily for the Huskies, Martin carried the load.
JACKSON’S TALENT, SANOGO’S POTENTIAL: Kimani Young is one of the Huskies’ ace recruiters and Sanogo’s and Jackson’s play didn’t come from nowhere. Speaking on the CT Scoreboard Podcast, Young is adamant that Sanogo can be one of the best big men in UConn history. As for Jackson? When you first see him, his athleticism sticks out. When you get to know him? It’s his work ethic.
NEXT UP: UConn is off until Tuesday, when it hosts Georgetown.
Huskies Must Adapt with Williams Out
The Story: The women’s basketball team will again be without Christyn Williams for tonight’s game against Seton Hall at Gampel Pavilion, so the Huskies must hope they can fare better than they did in their clunker Monday at Oregon (SNY, 7 p.m.)
AN EASIER CHALLENGE: Oregon was a borderline top-25 team that had been without several key players for stretches this season. Seton Hall is not, so if the Huskies slip up tonight and play just as poorly, they’re in more trouble than we realize.
• Williams missed the game against the Ducks because of COVID-19 protocols. She has not yet been cleared to return — and she will miss Sunday’s game at St. John’s as well — so the Huskies (9-4, 4-0 Big East) will have to go without her.
• With Williams out, it’s crucial that Evina Westbrook steps up to take some command of the offense and shoulder some of the scoring burden. Geno Auriemma said Monday that the guards played terrible in the game against Oregon, and that seemed to be a classic case of a coach criticizing a group rather than singling out one player.
• We hesitate to head down this route, because we honestly don’t know the answer and it’s a heavy subject. But is there a chance Westbrook has tuned Geno out? No matter the explanation, or the validity of it, she was benched for the first time on Saturday in the win over Xavier. Such a move can cause a rift, especially with someone who’s a senior and a pro prospect, so hopefully, they’re able to find common ground and support each other.
• We’ve also been hard on Olivia Nelson-Ododa at stretches this season, mostly because her preferred style of play doesn’t fit her physical talents. But we must give her credit for her consistency in recent games. Nelson-Ododa had 17 points, eight rebounds, six assists and three blocks against Oregon, and given the size advantage she’ll have this weekend, more eye-popping numbers will be needed.
WHAT DID GENO SAY? “In this short period of time, we have to change how we play. The way we’ve played for 25 years, we can’t play like that anymore. That puts a huge burden on everybody that we can’t play the way we’re used to playing. We’ve never been in this situation in the 37 years that I’ve been here. That’s never happened … never to this extent and never for this much of the season where we didn’t enough to make up for it.”
ABOUT SETON HALL: UConn won 74-49 in the first meeting on Dec. 3 and the Pirates (8-7, 3-4 Big East) will also have a different look tonight.
• Lauren Park-Lane, who is averaging team highs of 18.1 points and 6.9 assists per game, scored 20 points in the first meeting.
• Andra Espinoza-Hunter, who played in seven games for UConn in 2017-18 before transferring to Mississippi State, and then home(-ish) to Seton Hall before last season, is averaging 16.7 points and 5.9 rebounds a game. She missed the first game this season because of COVID-19 protocols.
Morning Reads
• Let’s put a fork in the Kevin Ollie era. We’ve let our displeasure known over the years that we felt UConn should have paid him his contract out and that he was fired for not winning games. An arbitrator agreed and UConn’s on the hook for $11.2 million. Pay your contracts, and always try to settle. (Associated Press)
• Donovan Clingan was named to the second-team all-tournament at the vaunted Hoop Hall Classic in Springfield over the weekend. (Hartford Courant)
• The men’s hockey team (9-9, 6-5 Hockey East) will play New Hampshire tonight and tomorrow at the XL Center, and coach Mike Cavanaugh‘s message to his players is simple: Shoot! (The UConn Blog)
• Former UConn standout Matt Barnes, who was rocky while playing for the Red Sox last season, will have to figure things out, perhaps mechanically, to get back on track. (NBC Sports Boston)
• Steve Emt, a walk-on to the men’s basketball team in 1992 and 1993 who was paralyzed in a drunken-driving accident in 1995, will be heading to his second Paralympic Games next month to compete in curling. (WTNH.com)
