Wright happy UConn is returning to the Big East
Hearst Connecticut Sports podcast: UConn men’s basketball beat reporter David Borges talks about the season with sports columnist Jeff Jacobs in the latest podcast. Borges and Jacobs discuss the second season of Dan Hurley’s rebuild and look ahead to UCon
UConn’s return to the Big East doesn’t become official until July 1, and the Huskies won’t be playing games in the league for nearly a year.
Not soon enough, according to most UConn fans. Too soon, according to some current Big East coaches, it seems.
Don’t count Villanova’s Jay Wright among the latter. Wright, who has guided the Wildcats to a pair of national championships over the past five seasons, is welcoming the Huskies with open arms.
“The one thing we really feel makes the Big East really unique is its authenticity,” Wright said by phone on Thursday. “Everybody’s a basketball school and makes decisions for basketball reasons. The fan bases are passionate about basketball. There are no schools where it’s ‘Oh, we’re a football school that’s got a good basketball team.’ UConn is an original Big East member, and they’ve always been in the footprint of what the league’s all about.”
Villanova hosts UConn on Saturday at noon at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia. It’s the last of a three-game series between the former and future Big
East rivals. Villanova, ranked No. 1 at the time, clobbered the Huskies by 20 on Jan. 20, 2018, en route to its second national title in three years. Last season, the Wildcats cruised to an 81-58 win at Madison Square Garden.
The teams, of course, will meet twice a year next season and moving forward as Big East rivals once again. UConn’s return to the league will certainly help on the recruiting trail, a fact bemoaned by Providence coach Ed Cooley and, to a lesser degree, Seton Hall coach Kevin Willard at Big East Media Day in October.
“I think it’s gonna be a bear to deal with,” Cooley said at the time. “They have a very good staff there, and Danny (Hurley) is one of the better coaches in the country. Regionally, with Providence College and Seton Hall, in particular, in the Big East — with a little bit of St. John’s — we’re gonna have our hands full when it comes to competing against them.”
Added Willard, seemingly half-jokingly: “I can’t tell recruits, ‘You know what it’s like to play at Tulane and East Carolina and those places?’ ”
While Wright seems to agree with both coaches, he’s not worried. In fact, he sees UConn’s addition as a big boon for an already terrific league.
“We know it’s gonna happen. It already has,” he said of recruiting against UConn. “You look back at the old Big East, when I was an assistant — everybody wanted to play in the Big East. It helped us all. It made it tougher recruiting, the (recruiting) battles were vicious. But it helped us all.”
It will certainly help UConn. The Huskies’ first Class of 2020 commit, ultra-athletic guard Andre Jackson, told Hearst Connecticut Media after his commitment in October that UConn’s return to the Big East definitely helped his decision. Javonte Brown-Ferguson, a 7-foot Canadian who committed to the Huskies in November, is a big fan of Big East history and said the return to the Big East helped solidify his decision.
As for Saturday, however, UConn will need all the help it can get. The Huskies are 10-6 overall and in the midst of a hellish stretch of games that includes Sunday’s home loss to No. 16 Wichita State and, four days after the Villanova game, a road trip to AAC preseason favorite Houston.
“They’ve been in every game,” Wright said of the Huskies. “Their last game against Wichita State was a great example of their incredible competitivness, toughness, scrappiness — much like all of Dan Hurley’s good teams.”
The 14th-ranked Wildcats are 13-3 and have won three straight, most recently an overtime decision at home against a tough DePaul squad.
“We’re getting better, kind of like UConn,” Wright said. “We’re fitting guys in, still growing. We haven’t had the consistency I’d like yet.”