Calhoun Gives Huskies Pep Talk

The Story: Jim Calhoun guided UConn to three NCAA titles and he told the players before they left for Las Vegas that they have something special brewing.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: No. 2 seed UConn is in the Sweet 16 for the first time since 2014. It participated in its final practice in Storrs on Monday before heading to Las Vegas and a date with No. 8 seed Arkansas on Thursday.

WHAT DID CALHOUN SAY? “You’ve only just begun. Right now, you’re 80 minutes from Houston. … You’re going on a weekend trip, 80 minutes. If I were you, I could smell it. I’ll guaranteed, 50 years in basketball, some guys I’ve had up here, you know, the teams I had, you’re more than good enough to do it. Bring yourself and bring everyone else with you. You’ve got something special going on. I can feel it. When you are this good this late now, it’s a great sign. You ain’t sagging. You’re ready to fly. Let’s get the 80 minutes. Let’s bring it in.”

HAWKINS LOOKS FOR COMPLETE GAME: Jordan Hawkins knows he can’t play half a game this weekend if the Huskies are going to make a run to the Final Four.

• In the first half of both NCAA Tournament games, the sophomore guard had zero points on seven shots. The second half? Hawkins scored 13 and 12 points as the Huskies cruised to victory over Iona and Saint Mary’s. Hawkins is the Huskies’ second-leading scorer at 15.9 points per game.

SANOGO FIRE: Adama Sanogo has had a good year, but maybe not the great one we hoped for in October when he was named the Preseason Big East Player of the Year. He’s living up to that building in the NCAA Tournament, though, with back-to-back 20-plus-point games.

• Sanogo’s opening-round performance offered the first double-double in an NCAA Tournament game since Alex Oriakhi in 2011. Our favorite stat? UConn is 19-0 this year when Sanogo scores 20 or more points.

— John Silver

Huskies’ Sweet 16 Return Never Guaranteed

The Story: Although we’ve come to take it for granted that the No. 2 seed UConn women would return to the regional finals and follow their well-trod path to the Final Four, two upsets in the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament demonstrated just how special Sunday’s victory over No. 7 seed Baylor truly was.

THE MIGHTY HAD FALLEN: A pair of No. 1 seeds lost their second-round games on their home courts, with Stanford falling to Ole Miss on Saturday and Indiana being toppled by Miami in the closing seconds on Sunday.

• Think whatever you want about either team earning a No. 1 seed, although Indiana had much more of a case than Stanford — a team that didn’t win the Pac-12 regular-season or conference titles. But each showed how tenuous being a No. 1 seed can be, especially as there’s more parity in the game than ever before and Stanford returned several key contributors from a title season two years ago.

• UConn seemed to be headed for a fight to stay out of the discard pile on Sunday when it led Baylor by only one point with six minutes to go in the third quarter. “I thought we were really, really, really in big trouble,” Geno Auriemma said. Instead, a decisive 16-2 run pulled the Huskies from the doldrums and kept them on top.

ON CLOUD 29: The Huskies are in the Sweet 16 for the 29th consecutive season and, with wins against No. 3 seed Ohio State and then No. 1 seed Virginia Tech or No. 4 seed Tennessee, will be back in the Final Four for the 15th time in 15 tournaments.

• UConn will make only its second trip to Seattle and its first since a road game against Washington in November 2000. It will be the first time since 2014 that the Huskies won’t play a regional in the Northeast, and the distance should significantly mitigate any type of home-court advantage.

• “We usually come into this tournament, we got everybody healthy for the most part, we’re rolling, and we just storm through the tournament. This year, none of that was true. Everything was a struggle. Everything was hard. And for us to be in the position that we’re in, to go to the same place … I was really proud of them because I’ve been through a lot of these, but they haven’t. So, to see them feel that [excitement] — I mean, this is why we do what we do, right?”

— Zac Boyer

Morning Reads

• The baseball team (12-5) will play its first home game of the season this afternoon when it hosts UMass at Elliot Ballpark. (UConnHuskies.com)

• The women's lacrosse team (4-3) will be in action this afternoon when it hosts Albany. (UConnHuskies.com)