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GO UCONN!!!!!
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The Boys and their Dogs -
Under the UConn blanket!!
GO UCONN!!!!!
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Only a few days left!!
Naismith fan voting has started. You can vote once a day. Paige and Aaliyah are on the ballot.
I predicted a 40+ win for the Huskies and I'm rethinking that number. Jackson State is one of the more experienced team that UConn will play. They have four grad students that start and one off the bench. And their fifth starter is a senior.
They are quick and tenacious. I think they could disrupt the UConn offense some. They don't have great skills so they will struggle to score.
More like a 20+ point margin.
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Paige and Aaliya Pregame Presser
SNY - KK, Ashlynn and Ice
on first NCAA Tournament
SNY - Paige and Aaliyah
on their last tournament together
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Geno talked today about working on a new contract as head coach for the Huskies women's basketball team. Now, personally, I think that is the biggest news we have had all season. Bigger than Paige coming back. Bigger than Aubrey coming back. Bigger than Nika and Edwards leaving. And even bigger if Strong committs to UConn.
We are talkikng about the best women's basketball coach in history. No apologies to Pat Summitt. Facts are facts.
Geno's current contract is through the 2024-25 season. It was just extended recently. Now he is talking about coaching through the 2028-29 season. That's four additional years. And five more in total after this season. That, god willing, mean that recruits from the class of 2024 and 2025 will have Geno their entire careers at UConn. Maybe giving a shout out to Sarah Strong that he will be there for her.
Geno - “The search should be worldwide. Worldwide. It’s going to take somebody who has tremendous confidence in themselves, has a track record of winning or maybe you want to start all over and hire a young person and there is something to be said for that. Some people hire from within and always keep it ‘in the family,’ that has worked some places, and it has failed miserably. I don’t think you automatically say, ‘We’re staying in-house.’ That would be a tremendous mistake. Don’t limit yourself to that, and don’t ask me who the next coach should be. How do you know I’m doing it for the right reasons?”
I'm not going anywhere!!
All I can say is that I'm so happy that we get to watch him do his magic for several more seasons.
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There was only one upset in day one of the women's NCAA tournament.
6 Seed Louisville lost to 11 seed Middle Tennessee State 71-69. One of the more consistant teams in the country, it marked the first time in Louisville head coach Jeff Walz's career that his Cardinals lost in the first round. Each of Louisville's 15 previous tournament teams under Walz won at least one game. Louisville had advanced to the Elite Eight or beyond in five consecutive tournaments. Louisville had jumped out to an 18 point lead in the second quarter but was not able to hold on to the lead. This was never that good a Louisville team this season. A tough ending for Walz.
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She has UConn in her final five schools
And she is classmates with UConn committ Kelis Fisher
The link to the article in yesterdays blog was bad. Here is a good one.
Women's Basketball Hosts Get Home Edge While NCAA Keeps The Cash
• Aaliyah Edwards did not play in the Georgetown game. She remains in sole possession of 18th place. She now needs 31 points to catch Stefanie Dolson.
• Nika Mühl has 651 assists after her 9 assists in the Georgetown game. She passed Diana Taurasi to move into second place all-time! She needs eight more to tie Moriah Jefferson.
• Paige Bueckers has 725 points this season. That ranks her 8th for points in a single season by a UConn player. She needs 11 to tie Maya Moore’s 736 in the 2009-10 season.
• Geno now has 1209 wins.
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By PHIL
A look at the 2023 Tournament
Part II
Women's Basketball Hosts Get Home Edge While NCAA Keeps The Cash
This table contains the margin of victory in the first two rounds of the 2023 wbb tournament. The regional names are on the left side, the next column is the seed number then the margin of victory is shown for the two rounds. For the moment, I'm deliberately not identifying the teams, we will get to that soon.
The cells colored green and yellow indicate that the higher seed won.
The cells colored red mean that the weaker team upset the stronger team.
Note that this matches the stats provided by the author - in the first round there were no upsets, in the second round, there were four upsets.
How can we figure out which of the upsets had something to do with home court in which of the upsets came because the teams were closely enough matched that in a single game the weaker team at least on paper could prevail? The answer is simple, we look at home-court advantage.
There are lots of places that calculate this stat, one of my favorites is Massey, who calculates home-court advantage for each individual team. The values (in 2023) range from 2.52 points per game to 2.93 points per game. Many people use three points per game, which I will use, but note that this is not a value that varies significantly by team, it's pretty much about three points or a little less for everybody.
If you think home-court advantage carries some weight, you ought to see a lot of margins of victory with values of three points or less. Look at the first round. The closest game was 14 points. Unless you are prepared to make an argument why home-court advantage is worth more than 14 points, not a single one of the first-round games can be attributed to the home-court advantage. To get seven upsets (same as the men) you would need a home-court advantage of 26 points, because seven of the games were closer than a 26-point margin of victory.
In the second round there were four upsets. In every other game the higher seed prevailed but one of those cells is colored yellow. That indicates that the margin of victory is within the three points generally ascribed to home-court advantage. That's the single game where one might argue that the result would be different if all the games were played on neutral courts. One out of 32. That's not zero but it's not remotely close to the numbers suggested by the author.
If you are still with me, you might remember that I promised there would be something relating to UConn and you're probably wondering when that's coming. Here it comes.
What were the names of the third seed and the sixth seed who played in the second round of the Seattle three regional? It was North Carolina versus Ohio State. (Still no UConn, I hear some people saying but some of you know what's coming.)
In the second round, on the home-court of Ohio State, they beat six seed North Carolina by two points. If that game had taken place on a neutral court, obviously no one knows exactly what would happen, but if you accept a three-point home-court advantage, that would have tipped the game to North Carolina.
If North Carolina wins, who did they play in the next round? UConn.
Instead of playing Ohio State in the third round we would've played North Carolina. On a neutral court Massey favors UConn over North Carolina by eight points. Obviously, no guarantee, but I like my chances of playing North Carolina who did not have anything close to the full-court pressure of Ohio State. If we beat North Carolina, we would next play Virginia Tech and they were a very good team. Maybe we don't beat them, but the tournament would've turned out differently. Massey favors UConn versus Virgina Tech by six points. We might well have made it to the Final Four.
I'm a fan of the home-court advantage for the first four teams, not because I think there is no home-court advantage, but because I think the downside of the modest home-court advantage is outweighed by the positive of having significantly better attendance. Attendance is improving and I look forward to the day we can rethink neutral sites, but the number of upsets won't be comparable to the men for a few years at least.
How ironic that the one example where home-court advantage made a difference might have caused the first early exit for UConn.
The cells colored green and yellow indicate that the higher seed won.
The cells colored red mean that the weaker team upset the stronger team.
Note that this matches the stats provided by the author - in the first round there were no upsets, in the second round, there were four upsets.
How can we figure out which of the upsets had something to do with home court in which of the upsets came because the teams were closely enough matched that in a single game the weaker team at least on paper could prevail? The answer is simple, we look at home-court advantage.
There are lots of places that calculate this stat, one of my favorites is Massey, who calculates home-court advantage for each individual team. The values (in 2023) range from 2.52 points per game to 2.93 points per game. Many people use three points per game, which I will use, but note that this is not a value that varies significantly by team, it's pretty much about three points or a little less for everybody.
If you think home-court advantage carries some weight, you ought to see a lot of margins of victory with values of three points or less. Look at the first round. The closest game was 14 points. Unless you are prepared to make an argument why home-court advantage is worth more than 14 points, not a single one of the first-round games can be attributed to the home-court advantage. To get seven upsets (same as the men) you would need a home-court advantage of 26 points, because seven of the games were closer than a 26-point margin of victory.
In the second round there were four upsets. In every other game the higher seed prevailed but one of those cells is colored yellow. That indicates that the margin of victory is within the three points generally ascribed to home-court advantage. That's the single game where one might argue that the result would be different if all the games were played on neutral courts. One out of 32. That's not zero but it's not remotely close to the numbers suggested by the author.
If you are still with me, you might remember that I promised there would be something relating to UConn and you're probably wondering when that's coming. Here it comes.
What were the names of the third seed and the sixth seed who played in the second round of the Seattle three regional? It was North Carolina versus Ohio State. (Still no UConn, I hear some people saying but some of you know what's coming.)
In the second round, on the home-court of Ohio State, they beat six seed North Carolina by two points. If that game had taken place on a neutral court, obviously no one knows exactly what would happen, but if you accept a three-point home-court advantage, that would have tipped the game to North Carolina.
If North Carolina wins, who did they play in the next round? UConn.
Instead of playing Ohio State in the third round we would've played North Carolina. On a neutral court Massey favors UConn over North Carolina by eight points. Obviously, no guarantee, but I like my chances of playing North Carolina who did not have anything close to the full-court pressure of Ohio State. If we beat North Carolina, we would next play Virginia Tech and they were a very good team. Maybe we don't beat them, but the tournament would've turned out differently. Massey favors UConn versus Virgina Tech by six points. We might well have made it to the Final Four.
I'm a fan of the home-court advantage for the first four teams, not because I think there is no home-court advantage, but because I think the downside of the modest home-court advantage is outweighed by the positive of having significantly better attendance. Attendance is improving and I look forward to the day we can rethink neutral sites, but the number of upsets won't be comparable to the men for a few years at least.
How ironic that the one example where home-court advantage made a difference might have caused the first early exit for UConn.
Milestone Watch
• Nika Mühl has 651 assists after her 9 assists in the Georgetown game. She passed Diana Taurasi to move into second place all-time! She needs eight more to tie Moriah Jefferson.
• Paige Bueckers has 725 points this season. That ranks her 8th for points in a single season by a UConn player. She needs 11 to tie Maya Moore’s 736 in the 2009-10 season.
• Geno now has 1209 wins.
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Tournament Section
Date, Time and TV
Play-in Games
Albany 1 Region
Round 1
Columbia, SC
Corvallis
Bloomington, Indiana
4 Indiana vs 13 Fairfield Saturday, March 23, 1:30 ESPN
5 Oklahoma vs 12 Florida Gulf Coast Saturday, March 23, 4:00 ESPNN
Notre Dame, Indiana
2 Notre Dame 15 Kent State Saturday, March 23, 2:15 ESPN
7 Ole Miss vs 10 Marquette Saturday, March 23, 4:45 ESPNU
Round of 32
Columbia, SC
1 South Carolina vs 8 North Carolina Sunday, March 24, 1:00 ABC
Corvallis
3 Oregon State vs 6 Nebraska Sunday March 24, 4:00 ESPN
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Albany 2 Region
Round 1
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Iowa City, Iowa
1 Iowa vs 16 Holy Cross Saturday, March 23, 3:00 ABC
8 West Virginia vs 9 Princeton Saturday, March 23, 5:30 ESPN2
Los Angeles, California
2 UCLA vs 15 California Baptist Saturday, March 23, 9:30 ESPN2
7 Creighton vs 10 UNLV Saturday, March 23, 7:00 ESPNN
Round of 32
Manhattan, Kansas
4 Kansas State vs 5 Colorado Sunday, March 24, 2:00 ESPN
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
3 LSU vs 11 Middle Tennessee Sunday, March 24 3:00 ABC
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Portland 3 Region
Round 1
Blackburg, VA
Columbus, Ohio
Los Angeles, California
1 USC vs Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Saturday, March 23, 4:30 ESPN
8 Kansas vs 9 Michigan Saturday, March 23, 2:00 ESPNN
Storrs, Connecticut
3 UConn vs 14 Jackson State Saturday, March 23, 1:00 ABC
6 Syracuse vs 11 Arizona Saturday, March 23, 3:30 ESPN2
Round of 32
Blackburg, VA
4 Virginia Tech vs 5 Baylor Sunday March 24, 8:00 ESPN
Columbus, Ohio
2 Ohio State vs 7 Duke Sunday, March 24, 12:00 ESPN
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Portland 4 Region
Round 1
Austin, Texas
Spokane, Washington
4 Gonazaga vs 13 UC Irvine Saturday, March 23, 7:30 ESPN2
5 Utah vs 12 South Dakota State Saturday, March 23, 10:00 ESPNU
Raleigh, North Carolina
3 NC State vs 14 Chattanooga Saturday, March 23, 2:30 ESPNU
6 Tennessee vs 11 Green Bay Saturday, March 23, 12:00 ESPN
Round of 32
Austin, Texas
1 Texas vs 8 Alabama Sunday, March 24, 6:00 ESPN
Stanford, California
2 Stanford vs 7 Iowa State Sunday, March 24, 10:00 ESPN
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UCONN's Bracket
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UCONN LINKS
Several links are pay sites. Sorry!
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Message Boards
UConn Territory - The best UConn women's message board ever!!!
Vol Nation - Tennessee women's basketball board
ND Nation - Notre Dame women's basketball board
Rebkell - WCBB for everyone that thinks they are smarter than everyone else
UCONN Information
UConn 2023-2024 Statistics (updated after 1st game)
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