No. 11 UConn Huskies VS Villanova Wildcats
17-4 (9-0) 13-7 (6-3)
Wedneday, January 31st, 6:30 PM
Finneran Pavilion
Philadelphia, PA
TV - SNY
VILLANOVA vs UCONN
UCONN LEADS 42-18
H: 19-7 | A: 18-8 | N: 5-3
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, #21 VU 58 Hartford, Conn.
02/18/23 #6 UConn 60, #14 VU 51 Villanova, Pa.
03/06/23 #7 UConn 67, #10 VU 56 Uncasville, Conn
Villanova Season to Date
Nova is having a decent season with their W-L record at 13-7 and 6-3 in the Big East. They started their season going 6-4 in their OOC schedule. Not the greatest competition. But they did play a couple of good Ivy league teams losing to Coliumbia 77-75 and to Princeton 61-58.
After the Princeton loss they lost their Big East opener to St. John's 51-46. A quick game against LaSalle in their last OOC game winning 74-60 and then they played and won their next five BE games beating Xavier 86-45, Seton Hall 50-45, Georgetown 53-51 in overtime, Butler 65-54, and then No. 22 Marquette 66-63. A great start to the conference season. They then lost to then No. 21 Crieghton 66-63 and Providence 82-76 in overtime.
Their last game before meeting UConn, Nova beat DePaul 95-64.
Comparative Team Statistics
Leader in Bold
UConn Villanova
83.5 PPG 67.1
59.9 Defensive PPG 59.7
23.6 Scoring Margin 7.1
51.4 Field Goal % 40.7
37.2 Defensive FG% 39.1
38.5 Three Point % 30.3
30.8 Defensive 3PT% 31,7
74.0 Free Throw % 73.1
37.4 Rebounds/game 36.5
4.8 Rebounding Margin -1.1
20.0 Assists per game 14.0
13.2 Turnover per game 10.2
1.5 Assists/TO ratio 1.5
10.4 Steals per game 7.6
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
OUT FOR THE SEASON
ACL
Achilles Injury
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Villanova Wildcats
Villanova Starters
Villanova Bench
Game Analysis
Returning starter 5'9" junior guard Lucy Olsen is now the star of the team and the leading scorer in the Big East. She has had a great season to date at 23.7 PPG nearly double her scoring of last season. She also leads the team in assists at 4 per game. Her shooting percentages are down this season, shooting 44.1% from the field and only 29% on threes. Her scoring is up because she is shooting a ton of shots. A true volume shooter. She takes around 25% of the team's shots and the same percentage of three point shots. She is fiesty like Nika, who will probably be guarding her for most of the game. It will be fun when they face each other.
A returning starter is Maddie Burke, a 6' senior guard. She is only averaging 4.9 PPG and has taken the second most three point shots on the team at around 4 per game. But she shoots them really poorly at 24.1%.
Christina Dalce is the only size on the ream at 6'2. The junior forward is a terrific shot blocker and averages over 2.2 per game. She won't add much scoring in this game or any game for that matter. She only averages 8.8 PPG and 10.6 RPG.
Junior Zanai Jones, a 5'6" guard has earned a starting spot this season. A decent three point shooter at 34%, she does a nice job of taking care of the ball with only 12 turnovers on the season.
Bella Runyan, a 5'11" junior guard is the final starter on the team. She is averaging 7 PPG and 5.4 RPG.
It looks like Villanova only goes 7 deep recently with Maddie Webber, a 5'11" freshman guard and Kaitlyn Orihel, a 5'10" junior guard, rounding out the rotation.
Nova is small and relies on one player for scoring. That is a recipe for disaster against a team loaded for bear after an embarassing loss. UConn will pressure the ball and run off every defensive rebound. Villanova is not a good shooting team so there will be plenty of those available.
Final Prediction
As usual, Villanova does not turn the ball over very often. Their issue is they are a terrible shooting team. And they haven't played a team like UConn, who is a team looking to make up for a bad performance in their previous game.
Last season every game was relatively close with the Huskies winning 63-58, 60-51 and 67-56. UConn couldn't break the 70 point mark. But I don't see that happening against this version of the Wildcats. They are really missing Maddie Seigrist.
A good barometer of how this game will go is comparitive scores. Not always the best way to judge it, I think it is an indicator of how it will go.
Against St. John's, Seton Hall, Georgetown, and Cteighton they scored 46, 50, 53 and 49 respectively. It's have to believe they will score more against UConn. Will the Huskies shoot better against Villanova than they did against Notre Dame? Or will they continue to be in the funk they were in in their previous game. That will determine the margin
My guess is UConn by 30+
GO HUSKIES!!
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