Winning vibes
Last year’s January struggles are a distant memory for Huskies
STORRS — Still tortured by his team’s performance in January 2023 despite the national championship that followed, or maybe just creating easy access to memories as a way to arm himself with another motivational tool, UConn men’s basketball coach Dan Hurley has essentially turned that period of time into some sort of contemptible companion or truly ugly inanimate locker room object.
“We’ve talked about January,” Hurley said Tuesday. “We were mad at January. We’ve said some derogatory things about January, throughout the month, like, ‘Let’s get January back for what January did to us.’ Some not-so-nice words about January. But now we have a chance, if we’re able to take care of business, to begin to love January. We hated January.”
January 2024 has been a different story. The No. 1 Huskies are soaring, having won all seven of their games this month, earning the top national ranking along the way, refining every area of their play before and after welcoming back injured center Donovan Clingan. The Huskies have uncorked something and, if they were to defeat Providence on Wednesday night at Gampel Pavilion, it would mean an 8-0 record in the month — a year after that distressing stretch of six losses in eight games which began on New Year’s Eve.
On Jan. 4, 2023, UConn was smoked at Providence, the second loss of a segment spent stepping back — like a bow with an arrow in place, as it turned out — to find the identity and ability to dominate the NCAA Tournament as it would in March and April.
This year, January has been a breeze. The schedule has been softer, of course. But the team has also been furiously focused, better each week through challenges
brushed off like snowflakes from the shoulder. All the while, January 2023 has been sitting there as someone mocking them from the corner of the room, something sitting there on the mantle overlooking the operation.
“Daily, it’s absolutely the same in terms of the preparation, how detailed we are with the scouting and the opponent that’s coming up and we really truly stay focused on that opponent,” Hurley said. “As a coach, you’re part motivator, part psychologist. If you feel like your team is feeling too good, you’re going to be on their ass. If you feel like your team’s a little beat up and has lost their confidence, you’re going to try and build it up.
“We’re still at the point right now where we really need to get better. This team hasn’t been whole for a long enough period of time where everything’s automatic like it was for us (late) last year. So our practices are still driving and pushing to improve, as opposed to maintenance-type
of practices. Show me any super successful organization where the leaders aren’t obsessing over every little detail and all the behaviors and the mindsets of everybody involved.”
UConn (18-2) has won eight games in a row, three since landing atop the Associated Press national poll on Jan. 15 — a home blowout of Creighton, a hangon-tight road win at Villanova and a complete dismantling of Xavier Sunday at the XL Center, 99-56, when the Huskies were the Harlem Globetrotters to the Musketeers’ Washington Generals.
“The vibes are tremendous right now,” sophomore forward Alex Karaban said. “Our confidence is through the roof. We’re playing great basketball right now and we’re really coming together as a team, especially when Donovan is coming back healthier, Steph (Castle) is coming back healthier. Last year’s January, it needed to happen for us to win a national championship — but we don’t want to experience that again.”
This is a strange time, a portal from one segment to the next. February is upon
the Huskies and there isn’t much season remaining, even if every team in America probably feels like there is so much ground still to cover.
Clingan returned to the starting lineup Sunday and had 18 points and eight rebounds in 18 minutes, a strong and efficient performance. He dropped a few pounds, as was requested, in his month away and his injured foot has not bothered him since returning. There’s potential for growth across the board as the team re-adjusts to his presence and his stamina increases.
Freshman Steph Castle continues to improve incrementally, learning college basketball and ways to impact the game. UConn expects him to reach yet another plateau by March. Karaban, Cam Spencer and Tristen Newton have settled into comfortable roles that were envisioned, and UConn, with Hassan Diarra, Samson Johnson, Solo Ball and others off the bench, are as deep as any team in the nation. Considering the rotation and fiddling with playing time is a welcomed challenge for Hurley, who was on cloud
nine Sunday after the Xavier victory — and back to his relentless ways during Monday’s practice.
“There’s a high level of relief when you win, but we enjoy it for that night and, the next day, the preparation starts,” Hurley said. “We’re maniacal about our preparation. I look for any type of crack in human behavior, of people getting complacent, and I was probably tougher on them after that game than I would be after a loss because you are fighting human nature. We’ve been on such a great run for a while here now. Don’t want to make yourself vulnerable by getting away from what we do. If we don’t stick to our script, defensively, offensively, on the backboard, playing as hard as we do, this thing will start to unravel like it did last year when we got away from our script. We’re just about the work. We turn the page very quickly.”
UConn has many goals to chase, the ultimate one being the first program to repeat as national champions for the first time since Florida in 2006 and 2007. The Huskies haven’t finished first in the Big East, or won the conference
tournament, since returning in 2020. And they haven’t finished undefeated at home since 2005-06, also the last time it finished first in the league.
January 2004 has been a totally different story than January 2023. Castle has been named Big East freshman of the week three times. UConn has outscored opponents 560-448. They flexed their defensive muscle, suffocating Creighton, and got back to that beautiful offensive basketball against Xavier that Hurley said weeks ago was coming upon Clingan’s return.
“Just the residuals from winning it last year, the confidence you get from that, that even with Donovan out we’d still find a way, with a belief in each other and a belief in what we do,” Hurley said. “Just a powerful confidence builder from last March and April and February, when we played real well.”
Hurley is constantly looking for leaks, cracks. He coaches January 2024 UConn pretty much the same way he coached January 2023 UConn, with minor adjustments to messaging and confidence building.
“It’s just that next game mentality, like, ‘I’m on to Cincinnati,’ ” he said, referencing the famous Bill Belichick quote. “It really is at this point. You’re really not talking too much about the standings. We really are just focused on trying to get this team from the tactic standpoint, from a cohesion standpoint, to start to play the exact way that this group needs to play to get maximum success. And I think as you get more into February, maybe start to shift a little bit of the message.”
Spencer played for Rutgers last year. He kept an eye on UConn’s national championship run, of course. And he has a full understanding that it didn’t come together without January 2023 coming apart.
“Last year the January wasn’t great for the team,” Spencer said. “So we wanted to flip the script on that and had a big emphasis on, I guess, attacking January. I think we’ve had a good month so far, but we have to finish it off the right way (Wednesday) and, you know, the season’s not over yet.”