Huskies get outclassed
NEW YORK — Not there yet. Not even close, really.
UConn may play harder and be more fun to watch this season, but the Huskies still lack leadership when it matters most.
Villanova, meanwhile, may have lost four players to the 2018 NBA draft and is a far cry from last year’s nationaltitle squad, but the Wildcats are still a proud team with enough veteran, winning players.
All of the above was abundantly evident at Madison Square Garden on Saturday afternoon.
Villanova ripped off a head-spinning, 19-0 run starting early in the sec- ond half, book-ended by a pair of Joe Cremo 3-pointers, and rolled to an 81-58 win over the Huskies before a largely bi-partisan crowd of 16,027.
The Wildcats shot 65 percent from the floor in the latter half and knocked down 8 of 12 3-pointers. During their game-alter-
ing, 61⁄ minute stretch, Villanova went 6-for-8 from the floor, including four 3-pointers. UConn went 0-for-6 and turned the ball over six times. Game, set, match. “For 23 minutes, we were in there with a chance,” said UConn coach Dan Hurley. “Obviously, part of our struggles in some of these bigger games — Florida State, Arizona — is just the bad stretches. Multiple offensive, multiple defensive possessions where we either don’t defend or have lost possessions, offensively.”
UConn (9-4) led 36-35 after Jalen Adams hit one of two free throws following a technical foul coach on Villanova coach Jay Wright — one Wright insists he didn’t try to get (and believes he didn’t deserve).
Whether that “T” spurred the Wildcats on or not, the evidence suggest it did. Cremo, starting in place of injured point guard Collin Gillespie, hit a 3-pointer to put ’Nova up by two — and for good.
When the carnage was finally complete 6 minutes, 41 seconds later, the Wildcats lead was 54-36, and shades of last year’s 14-18 disaster — which featured eight losses by 20 points or more, including one to ‘Nova — were everywhere.”
“For me, I think it’s more of a ... mindset,” said Hurley. “When things start going badly, you’ve got to get more determined, you have to get more solid, you have to trust your teammates more and you have to run offense less and get more stops and set better screens. That’s how you get yourself out of bad stretches, not by making a (hesitation) 17-foot pullup.”
Ultimately, Villanova (9-4) got leadership and terrific play from its two veteran guards, Phil Booth and Eric Paschall — the two key holdovers from last year’s national champs. And UConn didn’t get such play from its stable of veteran guards.
Booth scored 18 points on 6-for-6 shooting from the floor (including a pair of treys) and 4-for-5 from the foul line. Paschall netted a game-high 23 points on 7-for-12 shooting and knocked down four 3pointers.
“I mean, that’s what great players do,” Hurley mused.
On the flip side, UConn’s guard triumvirate of Jalen Adams, Alterique Gilbert and Christian Vital combined for a dozen of the team’s 17 turnovers.
“Twelve turnovers for our three starting guards,” Hurley noted. “That’s tough.”
Vital led UConn with 18 points and Gilbert added 14. Adams finished with eight points on 3-for-13 shooting, and turned the ball over six times.
“We didn’t want to play him one-on-one,” said Wright. “We didn’t want him getting to the lane and creating.”
Hurley was particularly critical of Adams after a two-point effort a week earlier in a win over Manhattan. Perhaps he didn’t want to pile on to the senior guard again.
“I like how he drove it at times. He had a couple of good days at practice. He got himself mentally ready to go today, it just didn’t go down for him. I didn’t mind the 3’s he took, we want him to shoot the 3’s. We need him in games like this, to perform at a high level to have a chance to win. So, there’s a lot of pressure on him. But I thought he had a good mindset, the ball just didn’t drop. If anything, just eliminating some of those tough pullups, those 15-footers, those 17-foot contested pull-ups. And then the turnovers.”
Ultimately, veteran players with national-championsip pedigree stepped up for Villanova, and left UConn’s veterans still trying to learn to do the same. It’s not for lack of effort.
“They try, man. These guys try,” Hurley insisted. “We just haven’t won a lot of big games the last, I guess, 21⁄ years. There’s just not a guy that maybe can rally the troops, because there hasn’t been a lot of rallying moments, at this point. But they’re trying. You can see them in the huddles, the guys are talking. These guys have played their hearts out. They’ve done it the whole year. But playing hard isn’t good enough. You’ve got to take care of the ball, take the right shot. It’s everything, for us. From leadership to screening.”
RIM RATTLINGS: Gillespie, Villanova’s starting sophomore gaurd who averages 11.9 points per game, did not play due to a head injury suffered in practice. Gillespie is undergoing concussion protocol.