UConn’s Cole taking charge
Guard might be Huskies’ most important player on roster
R.J. Cole was honored prior to Wednesday night’s game for having scored his 2,000th career point a few weeks earlier at Marquette.
If Cole continues his tenacious, fearless play on both sides of the ball, he could be feted for taking his 2,000th charge by season’s end.
OK, bit of an exaggeration. But along with currently leading UConn in scoring, assists and steals, Cole is far and away the team’s leader in drawing charges. He drew four charges in UConn’s 86-78, overtime victory over St. John’s on Wednesday at Gampel Pavilion. And while no such official records are kept, that matched what might have been the school record he set in a win over Coppin State on Nov. 13.
Cole has now drawn 14 charges this season. Again, no official records are kept, but that has to rival whatever number charges the human Visa, Phil Nolan, drew during any of his four seasons at UConn from 2012-16.
Taking charges isn’t for everybody. It’s a true skill, where a player has to have the coordination to keep his feet still while bearing the brunt of upper-body contact from an offensive player, not to mention the bravery to essentially fall backwards onto the hardwood.
“It’s natural, instinctual, just having a good feel for where you’re at on the court, and being at the right spots,” Cole said back in November. “And it’s personnel, knowing what the other team likes to do, so you can take those opportunities.”
Cole’s charge total was hardly the only impressive number he put up on Wednesday. The grad point guard scored 19 points, hit a couple of big 3-pointers, and doled out eight assists against just two turnovers in 38 minutes. He also helped hold Red Storm point guard Posh Alexander, who entered the game
averaging 15.8 points, to a relatively harmless 11 points on 4-for-13 shooting (including 0-for-4 from 3).
It was quite a difference from a year earlier, when Alexander scored 18 points and hit a trio of 3-pointers as St. John’s rallied for a comeback win at Gampel.
“We needed him to win that matchup (Wednesday),” head coach Dan Hurley said after the game. “He didn’t win that matchup in the game that we lost here.”
So while Adama Sanogo put up the gaudiest numbers — 26 points, a careerhigh 18 rebounds and six blocked shots in 40 minutes — Cole may have played a more integral role in the Huskies’ victory.
“R.J. outplaying (Alexander) in this game, and the charges — that probably was the difference in the game,” Hurley said.
While amassing a whopping 1,510 points during his two seasons at Howard University, Cole wasn’t exactly known as a defensive whiz. In fact, after that Coppin State game, Eagles coach Juan Dixon — who had coached against Cole several times while both were in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference — approached the UConn coaching staff.
“He never played defense,” Dixon recalled. “How did you get to get a guy like that to draw four charges?”
St. John’s coach Mike Anderson might have been wondering the same thing after Wednesday night.
Cole has certainly honed his defensive skills since arriving at UConn. After sitting out a year as a transfer, Cole was strong at times last season — never more so than when shutting down All-Big East first-teamer Marcus Zegarowski in an eventual overtime loss to Creighton.
Without question, UConn has proven to be a much better team when Cole, who’s averaging 16.4 points per game, is on the floor. After Cole left the Huskies’ Big East tournament semifinal bout with Creighton with a head injury last March, a 53-50 UConn lead rapidly turned into a 59-56 loss.
When Cole fouled out with 30 seconds left against Michigan State in the Battle for Atlantis on Nov. 25, the Spartans scored the final five points of the game for a 64-60 win. On Saturday at Seton Hall, Cole fouled out with 2:19 left in overtime and UConn trailing by three. The Huskies couldn’t even get a shot off in the final seconds of a 90-87 loss.
But Cole was on the floor all night on Wednesday — literally and figuratively. Sure, the 6-foot-1 (maybe) Cole found himself in a mismatch on Red Storm leading scorer Julian Champagnie in the waning seconds of regulation, and Champagnie knocked down a 3-pointer to give St. John’s a one-point lead with 4.7 seconds left.
“I’m just like, ‘Dang, that was a tough shot,’ ” Cole recalled. “But once we got the opportunity to force overtime, I knew from there it was five minutes for us to have a chance to win the game. I had the utmost confidence in us the whole time. I’m just happy we were able to close it out and win the game.”
And R.J. Cole played a huge role in that. After the Huskies had shot an awful 7-for-14 from the foul line in the second half, Cole shot 6-for-6 from the line in OT to seal the victory.
“It was very important to get back in the win column and just have a different spirit around the whole program right now,” Cole added. “It’s been tough, walking away with L’s in these close games. But it’s a learning curve for us, to keep taking the things that we need to that are necessary for us to win these close games. I think we’re taking the right steps right now.”