No. 6 UConn Huskies VS No. 21 Villanova Wildcats 23-4 (15-1) 23-4 (14-2)
Saturday, February 18th, 2:30
Finneran Pavilion
Philidelphia, PA
TV - Fox
VILLANOVA | UCONN LEADS 40-18
H: 19-7 | A: 17-8 | N: 4-3
01/22/00 #1 UConn 79, VU 46 Villanova, Pa.
02/04/01 #2 UConn 75, #24 VU 39 Storrs, Conn.
02/18/01 #3 UConn 61, #25 VU 43 Villanova, Pa.
01/19/02 #1 UConn 93, VU 60 Villanova, Pa.
03/04/02 #1 UConn 83, VU 39 Piscataway, N.J.
01/29/03 #2 UConn 58, #20 VU 38 Storrs, Conn.
03/11/03 #18 VU 52, #1 UConn 48 Piscataway, N.J.
02/28/04 VU 59, #1 UConn 56 Villanova, Pa.
01/15/05 #16 UConn 73, VU 57 Storrs, Conn.
12/08/05 #8 UConn 72, VU 56 Villanova, Pa
02/24/07 #3 UConn 92, VU 49 Hartford, Conn.
01/03/08 #1 UConn 88, VU 38 Villanova, Pa.
02/24/09 #1 UConn 74, VU 47 Storrs, Conn. 0
3/09/09 #1 UConn 72, VU 42 Hartford, Conn.
01/23/10 #1 UConn 74, VU 35 Villanova, Pa.
01/05/11 #2 UConn 81, VU 35 Storrs, Conn.
01/14/12 #3 UConn 72, VU 49 Villanova, Pa.
01/29/13 #3 UConn 76, VU 43 Hartford, Conn.
12/22/20 #3 UConn 90, VU 52 Villanova, Pa.
03/07/21 #1 UConn 84, VU 39 Uncasville, Conn.
02/09/22 VU 72, #8 UConn 69 Hartford, Conn.
03/07/22 #6 UConn 70, VU 40 Uncasville, Conn.
01/29/23 #5 UConn 63, VU 58 Hartford, Conn.
Villanova Overview
Villanova has proven they are the second best team in the Big East so far this season. Their only three losses were to then No. 21 Baylor 75-70, then No. 13 Creighton 67-46, and then no. 14 Iowa State 74-62. And in the last outing against then No. 5 UConn they lost 63-58 in a hard fought battle. These were the only games against ranked players. That should tell you something.
They did win a rematch with Creighton in their last outing 73-57, but Crieghton isn't ranked anymore.
They have beaten everyone else in the Big East, but the margin of victory tells a story.
Early in the season they beat Marquette 54-52, Georgetown 71-64, Butler 68-58, DePaul 71-64, and St. John's 64-61. It showed at that time that the Wildcats can win the close games but are in close games against teams UConn beat by large margins.
However, since the UConn loss, Vlllanova has beaten their last five Big East opponents by an average of 23.6 points. In other words they are on fire!
UCONN
are clickable to see their Bios
UConn Starters
UConn Injuries
Out for undetermined time
Knee Injury
OUT FOR THE SEASON
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Villanova Wildcats
Villanova Starters
Villanova Bench
Game Analysis
It's 1 vs 2 for the lead in the Big East standing again and the final run to the regular season championship. UConn won the first game at home and now Nova will be looking for retribution and to tie UConn for the lead in the Big East on their home court.
Last season Villanova upset the Huskies on UConn's home court 72-69 and then UConn hammered the Wildcats in the BE tournament final 70-40. UConn won this year by 5 points at home and I think the close game is likely in this matchup on Villanova's home court. The Huskies won't be taking the Wildcats lightly.
Of course, returning Big East POY 6'2" senior Maddy Siegrist leads the way for Villanova and is the leading candidate to repeat. She is leading the team in scoring at 29.4 PPG and rebounds at 9.4 RPG. She is shooting at 53.8% and hitting her three pointers at a 41.1% clip. All better numbers than she had last season. She is not only the favorite for the BE POY again but in the conversation for National POY. In the first game against the Huskies this year she had 25 points and 8 rebounds but it took her 23 shots to do it and she was 1-6 on threes.
Returning starter 5'9" sophomore guard Lucy Olsen is second leading scorer for Nova at 12.7 PPG. She also leads the team in assists at 4.4 per game. She is shooting very well in three point shooting percentage at 39.6%. A great number. I really like her game. She is fiesty like Nika. It will be fun when they face each other. In the first match up she had 19 points on 7-17 shooting and only 1-7 on threes.
The third returning starter is Maddie Burke, a 6' junior guard. She averages 8.1 PPG and has taken the most three point shots on the team at around 6 per game. And she shoots them really well at 40.7%. She doesn't get to the FT line much but she is 17-17 for the season. She had 6 points when they first played UConn this year.
Christina Dalce is the only other size on the ream besides Siegrist at 6'2. The sophomore forward is a terrific shot blocker and averages over 2 per game in only 22 minutes per game. She won't add much scoring in this game or any game for that matter. She only averages 6.6 PPG and shoots a low persentage at 38.4. She had only 1 point and 5 rebounds, but she did have 4 blocks in the first match up.
The final starter is Brooke Mullen, a 5'11" senior guard. She is a terrible shooter, only 25.5% from the field and 19.5% on ther 62 threes she has taken. She has 82 assists and only 34 turnovers. She had only 2 points in the first match up.
It looks like Villanova only goes 7 deep recently. Bella Runyan, a 5'11" junior guard, and Kaitlyn Orihel, a 5'10" sohpmore guard, round out the rotation. Between them they had only 4 points combined in the first match up.
One thing Nova does is take care of the ball. They have a 1.5 assist to turnover ratio and average only 10 turnovers per game. Wow.
UConn is coming off a great comeback win over Creighton outscoring the Blue Jays 23-12 to take the 2 pointe win. The Huskies will start their same five players and in the first match up only had Patterson to give the starters a rest. But she only played 5 minites. This game, they have Ducharme back and that is huge. She will probably play a little more than her 20 minutes against Creighton.
It will be interesting to see how they guard Siegrist. If they can slow her down as they have done in the past, UConn should pull this out. My guess is they use a combination of Griffin and Edwards, but don't be surprised of Juhasz and Ducharme gets some time covering her as well. The Huskies will mix it up.
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Final Prediction
So how will this game play out?
Size matters, and UConn goes 6'5", 6'3", 6'1, 6'1 and 5'10" with 6'2 off the bench. Villanova goes 6'2", 6'2", 6', 5'11 and 5'9 with 5'11" and 5'10" off the bench. The Huskies have to take advantage of that. It could mean a huge rebounding margin for the Huskies.
Nova struggled from deep against the Huskies in the last game but just like Creighton turned around their three point shooting from their first game against UConn I expect Villanova to hit a good percentage of their their threes in this game.
The Huskies have been struggling on offense but I am hopeful that having Ducharme back will help them loosen up the defense and give the Husky bigs more room to operate on the inside. Having both Ducharme and Lopez Senechal on the court at the same time is a game changer.
UConn has more talent on the court even with Siegrist being the best player. Gotta go with the Huskies by 6+.
GO HUSKIES!!
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