Doggydaddy's Den: UConn / Tulane II Post Game Report

UConn-Memphis Post game report

(pictures from the Hartford Courant, UConnhuskies.com)

Last time these two teams met, it was the game after Geno sat two of their leaders in Stewart and Tuck, and they responded with an 87-39 thumping of Tulane. It was not much different this time.

Tulane kept it fairly close early on, with UConn leading only 22-12 at the 11 minutes mark. But UConn went on a 12-2 run over the next 4 minutes before Tulane did a nice job closing the half, matching UConn 11-11 over the final seven minutes. Connecticut was up 45-25 at halftime.

In the second half, UConn played better, led by the defense. They scored the first 8 points of the half and just stretched it out from there. Geno put the bench in with one starter at the 10 minute mark and UConn leading 74-38. Early in the season, it was questionable how well the bench would play closing out games. They have come a long way as they outscored Tulane 20-9.

Overall, a nice game for the Huskies. No injuries (well a little blood was spilled), the starters got good minutes, the bench played well. Just what Geno is looking for at this time of the year.

After allowing Tulane to shoot 5-12 on threes in the first half, UConn held them to 1-7 in the second half. Conversely, UConn shot only 4-15 on threes in the first half and 7-13 in the second half.

My play of the game was from late in the first half. Jefferson picked the call cleanly from the Tulane point guard, passed smartly to Nurse and when the defender came back at Nurse, Kia slipped the ball back to Jefferson for the lay up. Pretty.

Game Quotes From the coaches

Geno

After the first half - "They had guys hitting threes that haven't made them all year. You really can't get upset about that. We're doing a good job on the people we are supposed to be guarding. They have kids on scholarships too, they are allowed to make shots. Second half we are not going to play it any different. We need to start knocking in threes of our own. They are giving us as many as we want and we're a good three point shooting team. We just haven't made many in the first half"

After the game - "We talk about balance on the offense a lot. Sometimes we are so quick to take threes because they come easy and don't want us to just rely on that. We talked about getting the ball inside about attacking the basket and I thought in the second half we had a really really good rhythm to our offense. Tuck started out with a couple threes. It's hard to play against us when we are shooting it well from the outside and we are playing inside. It took us a little time but like I said at in the interview in the first half it was gonna be ok. I thought in the first half we could have done a better job attacking their big guys because we have a height advantage. But they were content to sit in the zone for 3/4 of the game. Sometimes they force you to shoot from the perimeter. I'll tell you, Stewart and Tuck work so well together. But I tell you what, I think Gabby Williams just...I really enjoy watching her play especially like she played today. When she is on her game she brings energy to what we are doing. You know, as soon as she is in she makes a defensive play and makes a layup. She did exactly what I expected her to do in the second half."

Tulane Coach Lisa Stockton

On the first half - "We have to continue to be aggressive, when we do that we get good looks. I like the intensity, diving after loose ball. We just want to compete in the second half and see what we can do."

After the game - “I don’t think the score is an indication of how hard and how aggressively we played. I really thought our team, in a short amount of time from the last time we played Connecticut, battled. They are just an incredible offensive team. I do think games like this make us better. I challenged our team in the locker room, if we can play that focused and that aggressive for 40 minutes against UConn, we got to be able to do that against other teams in our conference.”

“We are right in it. Our goal for making the NCAA Tournament is still right there. The season is winding down and we have to stay focused and play that aggressive at Tulsa,”

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Here are player evaluations

Moriah Jefferson

Player of the Game

She was player of the game the last time these two teams met. This time she was all over the court on defense coming up with EIGHT steals one off of her career best of nine. She added to that 15 points on 6-10 shooting and 5 assists.

Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis

POG was tough to pick with another great game by KML. She was 5-8 from the field for the second consecutive game after an unlikely 0-4 in the game before that. This brought her NCAA leading three point shooting percentage up to 51.2%. She ended up with 21 points on 8-13 from the field. He defense continues to be solid and her leadership continues to shine. You can just see her taking charge in many of the huddles.

Breanna Stewart

Breanna is still in a bigtime shooting slump from deep. But as I said with Chong and Ekmark, you have to keep taking the open three pointers. Thankfully, the rest of her game is just all-world. On two point shots she was 7-10. Stewart scored 16 points and grabbed 10 rebounds for her fifth double-double of the season. She continues to be aggressive on both offense and defense.

Morgan Tuck

Tuck was great in this game. She is starting to find her three point shot and that just changed everything she brings to the table. She is 6-11 from deep over the last 5 games. Teams will have to honor that eventually and that will just allow Tuck to be more effective in driving to the basket. A nice stat line for her with 16 points 8 rebounds 3 assists and 2 steals.

Kia Nurse

Nurse is still struggling from deep, going 0-4 on threes. She is now 3-14 over her last 3 games. Keep shooting Kia!!!! She still hit the boards and played great defense in this game, spending plenty of time on the floor hustling for loose balls.

Kiah Stokes

Another quiet game for Stokes. She only played 11 minutes and was scoreless. She did grab 4 rebounds and blocked one shot. But teams like Tulane, small and quick, are not a good matchup and Geno recognizes that.

Saniya Chong

One of Chong's better games. She played outstanding defense (love the picture here) and seemed to be more aware. She delivered eight assists and while she was 0-2 on threes, she made a couple a nice drives that we saw to often in her HS tapes. Her confidence is soaring. You can tell she is putting the work in. She looks bigger and stronger as well.

Gabby Williams

No action shots of Williams playing. Too bad, she had some really nice plays in her limited time. You can read Geno's quote earlier in this report to see why she was limited to 10 minutes. But she just plays so well when she is in. She scored 8 points, and had 2 nice assists. Her defense was great with 4 steals. How unusual was it for Williams to have zero rebounds? This was her FIRST game all season where that was the case.

Courtney Ekmark

This was the only picture of Courtney for this game. DannyK always has good shots of the bench players. UConnhuskies and The Courant? Not so much.

Nice few minutes for Ekmark. Hit her only two three point shots and grabbed one rebound. But her effort is consistent. That's why she is still getting double digit minutes in these games.

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Just some pictures that I really liked!!!