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GO UCONN!!!!!
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The Boys and their Dogs -
Under the UConn blanket!!
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Aaliyah Pregame Press Conference
Nika Pregame Press Conference
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** Designates Upset
Games Sunday February 25th, 2024
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2026 No. 1 Player with UConn offer
Hamilton Neill talkes Brynn McGaughy
2025 5 star forward
Brynn has said that UConn is her dream school. And Geno just visited her.
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Straight from the Dog
A girl like KK is impossible to find pic.twitter.com/yZQgXhQo5F
— UConn Women’s Basketball (@UConnWBB) February 26, 2024
Paige Bueckers 🤝 Aaliyah Edwards pic.twitter.com/AeLFO9sKT4
— UConn Women’s Basketball (@UConnWBB) February 26, 2024
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The latest is out and UConn didn't move from a 3 seed in spite of being No. 2 in NET rankings and No. 2 in Massey.
Tennessee lost to LSU by 15 points at home and SECreme moved them from a 9 seed to an 8 seed. Huh??
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I'm leaving this here. It's important to know we have a couple of bigs available next season!
HOW TALL ARE THEY???
Folks keep saying that UConn's bigs are not big enough. This is a picture from the DePaul game.
It's certainly not an exact look at their heights but to me it's clear that Jana El Alfy is actually as tall as Amari DeBerry. DeBerry is listed as 6'6". I'd say that El Alfy might even be an inch taller.
Now look at Aaliyah Edwards next to Ice Brady. If Edwards is 6'3" then for sure Ice is 6'4".
Of course camera angles can disport things but that's my story and I'm sticking to it!!
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By PHIL
Where should UConn be ranked?
The mathematically precise response to that explanation is — horse pucky.
The winner in a one and done tournament is not always the favorite team — just ask South Carolina.
Not all paths are the same. Generally speaking the worse the seed, the tougher the path. With some very rare exceptions, being seated higher is better than being seeded lower.
Someone might point out that I’m talking about seeding, which is not the same as AP ranking. No, not exactly and officially not at all, but members of the selection committee are human, well, mostly human and while they might not have the AP ranking list in front of them, they generally know where each team is ranked.
UConn moved up to 10 in the AP rankings, but it’s probably more accurate to say that Oregon State, NC State, Colorado, and Kansas State moved down. Indiana technically didn’t move but they didn’t move up with all of those other teams moving down. It would be nice to think that the voters sat down and reassessed where UConn belonged ab initio but that’s not the way they roll.
So where does UConn belong?
Let’s start by examining why UConn deserves to be ranked ahead of South Carolina. Why start there? I’m inherently lazy and if this is successful, we’re done.
South Carolina
The selection committee is going to look at the NET nitty-gritty report. The committee values quadrant one wins very highly, as they should. On that metric alone, South Carolina has 11 quadrant one wins and UConn only nine. But I’m going to argue that quadrant one games are relevant. LSU notwithstanding, you will improve as a team by playing solid competition. Playing weaker teams has some value in working on sets and timing and other skills, but it can reinforce bad habits. You convince yourself that can get your jumpshot off without leaving the floor when your defender is 5’ 6” but then you find yourself blocked when you play a team with the defenders are 6 feet tall.
South Carolina has played 11 quadrant one games while UConn has played 14. Yes, five of those games were losses, but UConn learned more playing those five tough games, than South Carolina learned in their non-quadrant one games.
South Carolina’s schedule is reasonably tough but it ranks number 22 in the grid nitty-gritty report. UConn’s strength of schedule is number 1. Not even close.
Who is South Carolina’s toughest opponent to date? LSU, down there at NET number nine, a game where South Carolina escaped with a six point win after being behind most of the game. Yes, a win is a win, but UConn has played three teams tougher than LSU.
Not one, not two, but three teams tougher than LSU on UConn’s schedule. Has anyone played more top 10 teams?
Okay, I get it. I didn’t convince you. UConn has played a tougher schedule, and more top teams than South Carolina, but one of those top teams was South Carolina who won by double digits. I didn’t even convince myself, but I wonder if anyone will agree that the case is stronger than some people might think?
Quadrant 1 wins, Quadrant 1 games
1. South Carolina 11 11
2. UConn 9 14
3. Texas 8 11
4. Stanford 11 14
5. UCLA 11 16
6. Iowa 8 12
7. Utah 7 15
8. Ohio State 11 14
9. LSU 7 11
10. Notre Dame 7 12
Texas
Texas is ranked third in the NET. Yes, behind UConn. It would be nice to say case closed but we know UConn lost to Texas so we’ve got more work to do.
UConn’s loss to Texas came back in December when Rori Harmon was still playing. She didn’t just play, she had 27 points and 13 assists. And if we meet again, she won’t be in the game. Texas struggled a bit after losing Harmon and has come back strong, but UConn has dealt with player losses of their own and are getting strong as well.
Texas has a weaker strength of schedule than many of the top teams — ranked number 24. That shows up in the fact that Texas has only played 11 quadrant one games and only won eight of them.
UConn has more quadrant one wins and more quadrant one games and a much better strength of schedule.
The Massey matchup tool can be used to project a game result on a neutral court. It projects UConn beating Texas 71 – 68. That’s a close call but on most metrics, UConn has the edge. Texas obviously has the head-to-head result but given the loss of Harmon that is almost a meaningless data point.
Stanford
Stanford shines on many metrics. Fewer losses, more quadrant one wins, and they both played the same number of quadrant one teams.
When they are on their game and Cameron Brink is playing (and out of foul trouble) they are a tough matchup. But they have had their share of head scratchers. The early loss to Gonzaga looked especially bad when Gonzaga was unranked, and that loss looks better now that Gonzaga is in the middle of the AP rankings, but that was a loss by 18 points. UConn doesn’t have a loss that bad. They recently lost to Arizona, an unranked team. UConn has more losses than Stanford but none to unranked teams. (Stanford fans will point out that Brink wasn’t available for the game.)
The Massey matchup tool projects Stanford to be a slightly tougher opponent than Texas but it still projects a 72 – 70 win on a neutral court.
The simple answer is that if Brink has a monster game, Stanford will likely prevail but if Geno can figure out Brink, and one of his strengths is neutralizing the opponent’s top weapon, UConn should prevail.
Anything could happen, but UConn ought to be ranked ahead of Stanford.
I’m out of steam, so I’m going to stop now but the six teams I haven’t yet analyzed are all weaker than Stanford in the NET.
• Massey projects a UConn UCLA game to be 73 – 67 in favor of UConn on a neutral court.
• Massey projects a UConn Iowa game to be 81 – 77 in favor of UConn on a neutral court.
• Massey projects a UConn Utah game to be 75 – 68 in favor of UConn on a neutral court
• Massey projects a UConn Ohio State game to be 74 – 68 in favor of UConn on a neutral court
• Massey projects a UConn LSU game to be 77 – 72 in favor of UConn on a neutral court
• Massey projects a UConn Notre Dame game to be 74 – 67 in favor of UConn on a neutral court
I don’t realistically think that the AP voters will wake up and put UConn at number two where they belong, but could they at least examine the evidence and move them up to four or five or six?
Milestone Watch
• Aaliyah Edwards now has 955 rebounds with 17 against Creighton. She passed Peggy Walsh into 9th place. She is 52 behind Gabby Williams.
• Nika Mühl had 612 assists after her 8 assists in the Creighton game. She passed Crystal Dangerfield, is in 5th place and needs 20 more to tie Renee Montgomery.
• Geno now has 1204 wins, placing him second overall, ahead of Mike Krzyzewski.
Plus one for every assist block point rebound and steal. I don’t add extra for offensive rebounds as it already seems to favor the bigs. Minus one for every missed shot (2, 3 or foul), turnover or foul committed.
UConn 123, DePaul 39.
Net positives/minutes played: Aaliyah 33/31, Paige 29/33, Nika 19/33, Ashlynn 10/32, KK 8/22, Ice 7/22, Qadence 4/16, Ines 3/8, Amari 0/3.
Season: Paige 640/884, Aaliyah 620/870, Nika 327/896, Ashlynn 291/836, KK 240/841, Qadence 115/352, Ice 84/464, Ines 23/127, Amari 14/109. (Aubrey 195/308, Azzi 9/61, Caroline 7/58)
How’s about those layups through contact by Paige. A couple good things from Ines and Amari. My Evanston family was there rooting for UConn on tickets I got them. Go UConn, beat Villanova.
Both net and Massey have UConn number two. Let’s just hope for an Albany placement.
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Several links are pay sites. Sorry!
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