The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
‘DIFFERENT LEVEL’ UConn a ‘confident group’ in march toward history
BOSTON — From within the walls of their boxy little locker room at TD Garden, UConn men’s basketball players might not fully appreciate or care that they’re the increasing fascination of the nation as a team on track to go down as one of the best in college basketball history.
“We’re just confident in our abilities,” Tristen Newton said.
Another blowout was in the books. Another press conference was done. Another big step in the bracket had been taken. A shot at a return to the Final Four was officially on deck. Newton sat at his locker Thursday night following an 82-52 victory over San Diego State and considered what the outside world thinks about the Huskies bullying their way to the Elite Eight.
“I’m not sure what people watching at home think or what they say, but in the locker room we talk to each other and we know what we want to do and what we want to accomplish,” Newton said.
The perception of UConn as a cocky group was floated.
“I haven’t heard that one before,” Newton said. “I don’t worry about what other people say about us, honestly. I just worry about what’s going on with this group and if people think we’re too cocky, I guess you’ve got to do something about it. But we’re a really confident group of guys.”
The crowd surrounding him dispersed. Across the room, which means barely more than an arm’s reach over some equipment strewn about, Samson Johnson and Apostolos Roumoglou picked triangled peanut butter and jelly sandwiches from a cardboard box. Donovan Clingan was surrounded by cameras in one corner, same for Alex Karaban and Hassan Diarra in the other.
These guys, collectively and symbolically, look like the UNLV of Larry Johnson and Stacey Augmon, like the Duke of Christian Laettner and Bobby Hurley, like the Florida of Joakim Noah and Al Horford.
Or, maybe, UConn looks like something never before seen, a sport’s prime example of the sum of the parts being greater than the whole. No one is carrying UConn through one doubledigit NCAA Tournament victory after another — that’s nine and counting, by the way. The Huskies are overwhelming and exhausting one demoralized opponent after the next.
“It’s what really makes us unique,” Karaban said. “It’s hard to gameplan for us. There are just so many actions for so many different players on this team. It’s tough to guard. It’s tough to really approach a game and say, ‘I want to shut this guy down,’ and then we’ll have five, six, seven other guys. That’s what makes it special.
“Physically, what we do on the defensive and offensive glass, screening and making tough plays, we tire them out, physically. And mentally, too, just continuous pursuit of the ball and the determination to keep going, keep going. It’s tiring. And we run some complicated actions so we can mess up some teams’ principles on the defensive end.”
The setting changed, Brooklyn becoming Boston with the crowd livelier, the lights brighter, the audience growing each step of the way. UConn is halfway to a second consecutive national championship, one victory from the Final Four, and the work gets harder now as they continue to make basketball look easier.
“Coach, he talked about Brooklyn to Boston to Phoenix, and now we’re living it,” freshman Stephon Castle, whose maturation has further transformed UConn’s depth and balance, said of coach Dan Hurley. “It’s just been super surreal and super fun. I feel like I’ve gotten everything out of this year that I can so far.”
Winning this tournament is starting to take on a feel of inevitability, the kind that precedes each game along the way. Hurley has been using the term “Bulletproof ” quite a bit recently — not to suggest that the team is unbeatable, but to explain how it is built. If you commit to defense and rebounding, play selfless offense and simply play harder than the opponent (UConn always does), there are just not many circumstances under which the Huskies can actually lose.
What if they did, though? There would be no shame in that, but it would shock the nation because UConn has now set the bar so high on public display for what’s possible. Already, the Huskies have followed
a national championship with a run better than any defending champ since Billy Donovan’s Florida team returned all its key players and repeated in 2007. In UConn, with many new or players or players with new roles, there is such intrigue around what it is doing and how it manages to do it.
The Huskies need three more victories to match the accomplishments of five other UConn teams. This year’s version, already, is playing basketball at a level few teams in the sport’s history have. That, itself, is an accomplishment.
“This team is just so hungry,” Clingan said. “Everyone just wants to win and we’re not done yet. We’re trying to do special things. We’ve got three games left to do that. Really, Coach makes us like that. The way he was in practice [Wednesday], you would have thought — I mean, I don’t know how much he yelled when you guys [media] were able to watch, but he yelled and you would think we lost our last game. He just makes us so hungry and makes us want to keep going.”
Clingan was asked how long the team would allow itself to enjoy the latest victory. He looked up at a red digital scoreboard clock affixed to the wall that was counting down the time until tip-off of the night’s second game, which would produce UConn’s next opponent (Illinois).
“Six minutes and 50 seconds,”
Clingan said.
Outside, in the narrow hallway, Hurley was holding court with reporters. Among the topics were how his team might handle a close game, a superstition satisfied by Andrew Hurley dribbling out the final seconds, rebounding, particular performances and more. San Diego State players and staff members walked by, single file, luggage packed, silent, expressionless, headed home. Bobby Mullen, who runs media relations for UConn, shouted “Last question,” but there were a few more before Hurley finally slinked away into the peace of a coach’s office.
“We suck at winning close games, so you have to go with the alternative,” Hurley had said moments earlier, during his press conference, of blowing teams out. “No, I think the group, we have killer instincts. We play every possession with great desperation. We have NBA-level players that are incredibly well-prepared by Luke Murray and Kimani Young, two of the best coaches in the country, assistant head coaches.”
UConn has played some close games this season, even recently. The semifinal victory over St. John’s at the Big East Tournament March 16 was no picnic, for example. The team even lost three times this year, of course. But when you roll the way the Huskies have with all eyes upon them, on the stages they’ve owned, there is curiosity that becomes awe.
People seeing them play, or play in person, for the first time wonder if all games look like this way. No. Just many of them, and just about all the big ones. The Huskies are ferocious. Has a team’s commitment and execution ever so perfectly aligned with a coach’s approach and personality?
UConn is relentless. The team wasn’t even so efficient for a stretch Thursday, and then the lead was 10 and 20 and 30. They have too many capable players who are plugged into a different charger than their opponents. San Diego State was gassed. The game ends when the clock expires but the competition usually ends a lot earlier.
The Huskies have won 49 of 54 games since Jan. 31, 2023. Nine of those victories are March Madness victories by 13-plus points.
“Obviously we’re very comfortable in tournament play,” Hurley said. “We’re hard to prepare for. The way the defending champs have fared in recent history, it’s kind of been against the odds in terms of the season we’re having, following up the national championship with an even better season, winning the Big East regular season by multiple games and setting a program record now for wins and winning the Big East Tournament. And now getting to an Elite Eight. This team has defied what past champions have done, and taken this program to a completely different level.”