No. 11 UConn Huskies No. 10 Texas Longhorns
4-2 8-0
Sunday, December 3rd
2:00 PM EST
Austin, Texas Moody Center
TV: ABC
Matchup History
TEXAS | UCONN LEADS 10-0
H: 2-0; A: 2-0; N: 6-0
04/06/03 #1 UConn 71, #4 Texas 69 Atlanta, Ga.
01/17/05 #13 UConn 73, #15 Texas 57 Hartford, Conn.
02/12/06 #4 UConn 71, Texas 58 Austin, Texas
03/25/08 #1 UConn 89, Texas 55 Bridgeport, Conn.
11/17/09 #1 UConn 83, #10 Texas 58 San Antonio, Texas
03/28/15 #1 UConn 105, Texas 54 Albany, N.Y.
03/28/16 #1 UConn 86, #7 Texas 65 Bridgeport, Conn.
12/04/16 #2 UConn 72, #14 Texas 54 Uncasville, Conn.
01/15/18 #1 UConn 75, #9 Texas 71 Austin, Texas
11/14/22 #5 UConn 83, #3 Texas 76 Storrs, Conn.
Texas Season to Date
Texas has had a great start to the season, winning their first eight games and moving up to the 10th spot in the rankings one spot ahead of UConn.
Other than a closer game against Liberty every other win has been by 32 or more points. Are they that good or is that a product of playing weak teams?
They started the season win a 80-35 win over Southern. The next game was the most competative with a 75-57 win over Liberty.
The last 6 games? All big time blowouts. 110-64 over UT-Arlington, 96-44 over La Tech, 84-42 over Arizona State, 101-39 over High Point, 76-44 over South Florida and in their last game before UConn 112-74 over Oral Roberts.
Massey has their opponents ranked 240, 150, 248, 209, 74, 224, 77 and 165. Not exactly Murderers Row.
Texas is ranked No. 4 by Massey but their SOS is 141.
The stats I have below are based on that easy schedule and UConn's No. 2 SOS so don't take much from that info.
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Comparative Team Statistics
(leader in bold)
UConn Texas
77.2 PPG 88.9
63.8 Defensive PPG 46.4
13.4 Scoring Margin 42.5
45.4 Field Goal % 50.4
36.8 Defensive FG% 36.9
33.3 Three Point % 35.6
30.7 Defensive 3PT% 25.0
74.2 Free Throw % 61.5
38.7 Rebounds/game 45.3
1.7 Rebounding Margin 17.9
15.5 Assists per game 20.3
12.7 Turnover per game 11.6
1.2 Assists/TO ratio 1.8
9.0 Steals per game 12.0
3.7 Blocks per game 4.3
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UCONN
The player and coaches names for both teams
are clickable to see their Bios
are clickable to see their Bios
UConn Starters
UConn Injuries
Day to Day
OUT FOR THE SEASON
Achilles Injury
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Texas
Texas Starters
Texas Bench
Game Analysis
I don't know, you look at the stats comparison I did and UConn only has an advantage in two categories. Texas stats look so good UConn shouldn't even travel to the lone star state. Just stay in cold Connecticut and practice.
But as we all know, stats can be deceiving. And these certainly are. These stats are all a product of the teams Strength of Schedule, or SOS.
According to Massey, the Huskies are playing the second hardest schedule and boy does it feel that way.
Texas, on the other hand is playing the 134th hardest schedule. And they play 158th rated Oral Roberts on Wednesday. More stats feeding for the Longhorns.
One of the few stats that is not related to the SOS is free throw shooting. You are at the line 15 feet away and you shoot. And in a close game, the 61.5% for Texas might be a difference maker.
Ok, on to the analysis.
The Longhonrs have two great platers in 6'4" Taylor Jones and 5'6" Rori Harmon.
Jones is the leading scorer on the team at 16 PPG and is the leading rebounder at 6.4. Not very impressive but because of the blowouts that Texas has been playing she is only in the game for 18.1 MPG. Play her 25-30 minutes and those stats look totally different. She is just a tough matchup. She moves well and is tough in the post. Jones came in off the bench last year for 28 minutes, 10 points and 8 rebounds. She also had 3 blocks. And in her last outing she was 11-11 from the field for 27 points and 16 rebounds. She came off the bench last year against UConn scoring 10 points, snaring 8 rebounds and blocking 3 shots.
Harmon is the star of the team and was out with an injury in the game last year. I'm sure she is looking forward to playing the Huskies. She is the second leading scorer at 12 PPG and the best passer averaging almost 7 assists per game.
The rest of the starters are really good complimentory players.
6'1" freshman forward Madison Booker is a load. She plays like a guard but is so starong, she is hard to keep out of the paint. She is averaging 10.8 PPG and like almost every Texas player has a positive assist/turnover ratio.
Amina Muhammad, a 6'4" sophomore forward really compliments Taylor in the front court. They are a tough duo to defend. She is just one point short of double digit scoring averaging 9.9 PPG. She is second in rebounding behind Taylor at 6.6 RPG. A true inside player, she hasn't taken a three pointer but doesn't have to as she shoots 67% from the field. She came off the bench against UConn last season and scored 4 points and grabbed 3 rebounds.
The last starter is Shaylee Gonzales, a 6' guard that is in her second season at Texas after transferring from BYU. She led the team in scoring last season and is averaging 9.6 PPG this year. She is just a really smart player, seems to be in the right place and the right time throughout the game. Shaylee has a terrific assist/turnover ratio of 15/4. She had 7 points against UConn last season.
I'm not sure how much time the bench will get in this game. But they do have four players that have seen double digit minutes.
Ndjakalenga Mwenentanda is a 6'2" sophomore guard who gives Texas a big guard off the bench. She is averaging 7.5 PPG and does a great job getting to the foul line. Hopefully this is the last time I have to type her name. It's a mouthfull. She had a great game against UConn lst year with 13 points and hit her only three pointer.
Khadija Faye is the big off the bench for Texas. The 6'4" senior from Senegal actually started two games this year in place of Jones. She is shooting 54% from the field in scoring 7.3 PPG. Faye also adds 5.3 RPG and all in only 16 MPG. She only played 5 minutes in last year's matchup.
6' Senior guard Shay Bolle gets the most minutes off the bench at 24.7 MPG. She is another solid ball handler with 20 assists and only 10 turnovers. She has started 28 games in her career one of them against UConn last season. She scored 7 points in that game.
Three point specialist Gisella Maul is a 5'11" freshman guard. She is 3-18 on two point shots and 9-20 on three pointers. I'm not sure how much time she will see in this game. Not much is my guess.
Because of the long gap between games, I get a little time to put this together. I watched the entire Texas-Libery game as that was the most competative one where Vic limited his rotation to only 8 players. A much more realistic look on how they might play the Huskies.
One thing they do is pressure the inbounds pass after they make a basket. And when I say pressure I mean PRESSURE! It looked like they had 7 players on defense and made it really really difficult for Liberty to get the ball in without turning it over.
Interestingly enough, they drop the pressure once the ball is in so they don't give up any easy baskets. At that point they fall back into a pretty standard man-to-man defense.
This is another game where the opponent's height will be a problem. Texas has three players that are 6'4". They don't all play at the same time but there is usually two on the court at the same time. That means Griffin will be covering someone much bigger than her. We will probably see Brady and Edwards on the court together for several minutes.
I don't think we will see much full court pressure from the Huskies. Harmon is a very diffuclt player to press. And Texas is not a big three point shooting team. They only take around 12 per game. They love to drive to the basket off screens and Jones is a terrific post up player. She will be tough to stop.
UConn will have to feature Paige in this game like they featured Azzi in last years game where she scored 32 points. They might need a 30+ game from Bueckers. And I am excited to see Arnold take the next step in her UConn career. I expect her to play great in this game.
Final Prediction
It's hard to stay optimistic lately. So much negativity coming from the fans. Some of it justified. But I have watched this program for 30+ years and if anyone can figure this out it's Geno and his talented staff. There is plenty of talent on this team and it's just a matter of figuring out the roles and getting the freshmen experience on the court. As much as fans want to see it turned around in a day, it's a process and it takes time.
The Huskies had a full week to work on things and to heal. I'm hopeful we see Caroline for some minutes in this game. I'm looking forward to see what Geno has done to change the 3 point focused offense that has to be dropped for a more traditional game plan. He knows what he has and what he has to do.
As I noted, Texas hasn't played any tough teams. So, how will they handle a competative game? UConn has been there several times already. Will that be their advantage? I believe so.
This should be a close game throughout. I don't see any team with a double digit lead. But I do see UConn squeaking out a close win.
UConn by 3+.
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