After watching the UConn Huskies men’s basketball team on Saturday, you really had to wonder how they would respond against the No. 3 team in the nation, the Villanova Wildcats. Head coach Jim Calhoun said that only one player stood out against Cincinnati and that was point guard Kemba Walker.
Well it was once again Walker’s time shine as his career-high 29 points helped spur an 84-75 upset over the Wildcats in front of 18,123 at the Wachovia Center in Philadelphia, PA on ESPN’s Big Monday.
The Huskies improve to 15-11 (5-8 Big East) while the Wildcats fall to 22-3 (11-3 Big East).
Walker was huge from the free throw line. He was 14-of-16 and also hit three 3-pointers along with pulling down nine rebounds. Jerome Dyson added 15 points, five rebounds and led the Huskies with six assists. Stanley Robinson chipped in with 10 points and seven rebounds while Alex Oriakhi added 10 points.
Scottie Reynolds led the Wildcats with 18 points, although he had only four in the second half as Dyson put the clamps on him. Corey Fisher added 14 points and Antonio Pena had 10 points before fouling out.
For the first part of the first half, the two teams stayed close. But with the score tied at 15, the Huskies went on a 6-0 run. The Wildcats rallied though on a 7-1 run and tied the game up on a Reynolds’ three-pointer.
It stayed close for the rest of the first half and with ‘Nova leading 35-31, the Huskies would close out the half on a 5-0 run behind a Jamal Coombs-McDaniel three-pointer and Dyson layup to take a 36-35 lead at the break.
Walker got the Huskies going in the second half as he opened it up with a three. Walker would hit another three-pointer as part of a 8-2 run that opened up a seven point lead at 44-37.
A Dyson free throw gave the Huskies an eight point lead at 52-44 but the Wildcats would get the lead down to five at 55-50 on a Maalik Wayns jumper. Another Walker three and a Gavin Edwards free throw gave the Huskies a nine point lead at 63-54.
UConn would push the lead to eleven points on a Oriakhi dunk with 4:20 to go in the game. Villanova wouldn’t go away though as they hit three straight 3-pointers to get UConn’s lead down to five but the Huskies would hit most of their free throws down the stretch to ice the game.
This was probably the first time all season long that we’ve seen UConn play a full 40 minutes. This was the UConn team that we expected to see all season long.
The big question remains though.
Is it a little to late for the Huskies? Only time will tell that but if they can put forth this kind of effort for their final five games plus the Big East Tournament, you never know what could happen.
The Huskies are back in action on Saturday afternoon when they travel to Piscataway, NJ to take on the Rutgers Scarlet Knights in a Big East matchup. The game is scheduled to start at 4 p.m. and will be televised locally here in Connecticut on My-TV9 and SNY.
Notes and musings:
UConn Huskies @ Villanova Wildcats 2.15.10 box score
A little different look for the Huskies to start the game. The starters were Kemba Walker, Jerome Dyson, Stanley Robinson, Ater Majok and Charles Okwandu.
The Huskies shot 47.8% (22-of-46) from the floor while the Wildcats shot 40% (26-of-65).
UConn had 14 assists on their 22 made baskets.
The Huskies were 5-of-13 (38.5%) from three-point land while the Wildcats were 7-of-24 (29.2%).
The big difference in the game was the disparity in free throw shots. The Huskies were 35-of-44 (79.5%) while ‘Nova went to the line only 20 times, making 16 of them (80%).
The Huskies didn’t take too good of care of the ball as they had 17 turnovers. Villanova had just nine.
UConn won the battle of the boards 40-29.
