New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
UConn in need of its bench to step up
Strong play from reserves could help starters get rest
STORRS — Ice Brady grabbed two rebounds less than one minute after checking into the UConn women’s basketball game on Friday night.
She wasted no time figuring out her place on the court and how to best help her teammates.
At 8:53 in the second quarter, she dove after an offensive rebound that was headed out of bounds. Brady kept the ball in play by tipping it out toward an open Ashlynn Shade for the easy jumper to put UConn up by 20 early over Georgetown.
It’s that selflessness and drive that the No. 15 Huskies need most from their bench.
UConn has just four regular season games left starting with No. 20 Creighton in Hartford on Monday and the Huskies need the reserves to step up now more than ever to give its starters ample rest ahead of the postseason.
“Coming out of (the South Carolina loss), we felt like, especially, our top five or six played way, way, way too many minutes and as we get down the stretch here, some of our players some of our subs have got to play more,” Geno Auriemma said. “And they’ve got to feel comfortable playing more. And we’ve got to be comfortable, as coaches, putting them in not just one were up a lot, but in games that are a little more competitive.”
Brady showed she could rise up and meet the moment coming off the bench the last time UConn met Creighton. She was everywhere on the floor, impacting the game on both ends and playing fearlessly. Brady, a redshirt freshman after sitting out last year with a knee injury, finished with three points, five rebounds, two assists and one steal in 15 minutes.
She continued that effort in UConn's game at St. John's about a week later. Brady played 24 minutes and was second on the team with 17 points on 7 of 11 shooting.
Brady's next big game, however, didn't come until last Wednesday when she recorded her first career double-double with 11 points (5 of 5 from the floor) and 14 rebounds in UConn's win at Xavier. And on Friday, she again went a perfect 5-for-5 and ended the game with 10 points along with five rebounds. But what the stats don't show,is that Brady has learned how to best play alongside starting forward Aaliyah Edwards.
“I think our chemistry has grown over the past couple of games,” Edwards said. “I know it's been choppy, but that's with anything, especially it's her first year getting back, getting a feel for how she moves, getting a feel for playing with us two big guys on the floor. So, I think that she's grown over these past couple games and just needs to build on that.”
Said Auriemma, “The thing with Ice is she has a lot of ability. She has really a good set of basketball skills and she shows she can make the right pass and she can make a jumper and she's smart defensively. It's just been hard to get her to exert herself as hard as we need her to to be effective in games.”
After Brady, though, the rest of UConn's bench hasn't made as significant an impact.
Freshman guard Qadence Samuels plays fearlessly, yet she's been subbed into the game later and later. On Friday, she played just two minutes in the first half and didn't check back until midway through the fourth quarter. UConn defeated the Hoyas by 40 points and led by as many as 20 early in the second quarter.
Samuels did play a season-high 23 minutes at Xavier and finished with eight rebounds and 10 points. Auriemma has said that as much he loves Samuels' confidence in her shot, she's still learning when to pass up a bad look.
“God bless her,” he said. “She's like a wildcard. … She's getting better all the time. It doesn't always show but we're short on numbers. So, if we can get Q to just keep grinding and keep pushing it, she's a kind of guard that we don't have. She's the only guard that's that long and that athletic. I'm rooting for her. Sometimes you just gotta close your eyes with some of the shots or some of the things she does, but she's not afraid, let's put it that way.”
The Huskies' other two reserves have yet to see significant minutes this season. Point guard Inês Bettencourt is averaging 5.9 minutes across 20 games while 6-foot-5 forward Amari DeBerry is averaging 4.6 in 22 games.
Auriemma has no other options. He knows his stars can't play to their full potential without rest during games, yet he often doesn't play Bettencourt or DeBerry until the end of the fourth quarter (DeBerry played just the final two minutes in UConn's blowout of Georgetown).
Meanwhile Paige Bueckers, Aaliyah Edwards and Nika Mühl are all averaging about 30 minutes a game.
The Huskies' margin of error this spring is so small that Auriemma knows he has to give his bench more minutes in these last handful of regular season games to prepare for the postseason.
“We're running out of time,” he said. “The season's over in a couple of weeks, the Big East season's over, and this is the time when good players start to start to prove it: prove that they're good.”