The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
UConn kept cool in shaky start, then made Big East history
PROVIDENCE — The UConn men’s basketball team, by now, certainly knows what it’s capable of and just about always knows what to expect of itself over a two-hour period, no matter the gym, the city, the situation, the environment.
So when the Huskies fell into an early hole Saturday night at Amica Mutual Pavilion, Dan Hurley and his players talked about the opponent as much as themselves.
The word “unsustainable” was used time and again. Providence wouldn’t keep making long 3-pointers. The Friars wouldn’t keep up with their chosen defensive pace. Ultimately, they would be outclassed like so many others in the Huskies’ wake of this historic regular season.
“I mean, this is their home floor,” UConn freshman Stephon Castle said. “They’re going to go on a run. They’re a good team, they’re well coached, but we think we’re the best team in the country and we have a great scout every game so we believe in what we do. So we just stuck with it and you saw the result.”
Put it in the way-worse-than-the-final-score-indicates column. No. 2 UConn skipped into the postseason with a 74-60 victory, falling behind 15-2 before another freewheeling show. The energy in the building on Senior Night, against a desperate team on the NCAA Tournament bubble, could have proven claustrophobic for some teams. But instead of feeling like the walls were closing in — it has happened here before, to other UConn teams, even last season’s — the Huskies were an unflappable force.
UConn went on a 40-9 — forty to nine — run to close the first half and led 45-24 after Alex Karaban made a 3-pointer early in the second. The lead was 26 at one point. Donovan Clingan made a 3. Samson Johnson dunked and rebounded as he pleased. Karaban led five players in double-figures with 16 points.
It became a breeze, like most games. It was a little downtown stroll, history made along the way. This version of the Huskies is the first UConn team to win 28 games in the regular season. It is also the first Big East team to win 18 conference games.
It played out to the odds, real
ly. The first four minutes were a mess but they’re allowed to be. Hurley was issued a technical foul, one he was seemingly begging for. But he never called timeout in that early stretch. He didn’t need to.
The Huskies have more than trophies for their accomplishments over the past calendar year. They have the not-bothered moxie of a team that knows it’s better than the one it is facing and understands there is enough time to prove that.
“There’s a real edge to the game when you come in here,” Hurley said. “I just think it took us a while to get comfortable.”
Later, he said, “It is a long game. We were getting jumped. Physically, we were getting beat to basketballs. We weren’t playing hard enough. So I kind of jumped them in the huddle. And then we quickly talked about how this is unsustainable and we just have to weather the storm.”
UConn responds. Last year’s championship team responded to the January swoon, six losses in eight games, to win the title in dominant fashion. This year’s team responds to every little challenge within games. Last time these teams met, Jan. 31 at Gampel Pavilion, it was an unmanageable mess of whistles that lasted over two and a half hours.
This time, there was one whistle worth noting, really. Hurley was issued the technical with UConn trailing 9-2, the packed building intent on swallowing them up.
He was asked if that was a smart technical, given that it might have changed momentum. He dismissed that, saying all technicals are dumb.
“Because we’re winning a lot these days, those are [considered] good techs,” he said. “But when I couldn’t get out of the first round of the [NCAA] Tournament, I was a madman getting bad techs.”
Eventually, Hurley was exiting, as has become habit, as sort of a madman. He jarred at fans while escorted by police. One could question what he gets out of that.
Another question: Has there ever been a better UConn team? At least five, of course, in terms of accomplishment. Potential and style points and approach can only be celebrated to a certain level, but this team looks as good as any team that has called Gampel Pavilion home. The Huskies have won 43 of 47 games since Jan. 31, 2023. A team doesn’t do that through panic.
Strange things happen in Providence. Saturday’s game, for a flash, had a familiar feel. What’s the key to staying poised? Tristen Newton seemed find the question comical.
“Carter, he’s shooting shots from like 30 feet and they’re going in,” Newton said of Providence’s Devin Carter.
“We weren’t too worried about that. We couldn’t make a shot in the beginning. We just knew what they were doing wasn’t sustainable, to stay composed, and we’re going to get our offense going. And as soon as we got our offense going and they missed some shots, we got into transition and just broke the game open.”
How about the crowd? It was announced as 12,608. It was rowdy. “They’re not really doing much,” Newton said. “All they’re doing is yelling. They can’t help their team. They can’t make a shot go in. They can’t stop us from scoring. So it’s just noise. We’re good on the road.”
UConn is good everywhere. Now it’s on to New York for the Big East Tournament. There couldn’t have been a better way to close the regular season. Hurley said it felt good to win at the AMP, formerly the Dunk (Dunkin’ Donuts Arena). He entered 0-4 in the building, having lost three times as coach at Rhode Island and once at UConn.
“I’ve had to eat a lot of [bleep] in this building,” Hurley said, adding that he wasn’t focused on that. “We were thinking history,” he said. “We were thinking legacy. We were thinking exclamation point on the regular season.”
Exclamation applied. It fit neatly into the program’s mantra for the season: “Everything.”
UConn hasn’t won everything yet, but it’s won all that’s been up for grabs. So few teams follow up a national title with a season to remember and this qualifies as that already.
Even if the Huskies get Gerry McNamara’d at the Big East Tournament, or come up short of the Final Four — as unlikely as something like that feels after seeing them play Saturday.
The Huskies, locked into a No. 1 NCAA Tournament seed and virtually guaranteed a Brooklyn-Boston road map, are a machine.
Machines sometimes need a few minutes to warm up.
“We didn’t expect quite that type of start, but we knew they would start fast,” Hurley said. “We’ve been in big spots. This program has achieved a lot and has a lot of confidence and believes.”