Maya Moore led five UConn Huskies in double figures with 18 points to lead them to a 77-62 win over the DePaul Blue Demons in front of 8,424 at Gampel Pavilion.
The win for the No. 1 Huskies improves their record to 16-0 (3-0 Big East) for the second consecutive season. The Blue Demons fall to 13-5 (1-3).
Moore also picked up her 7th double-double of the season and 18th of her career adding 12 rebounds. Renee Montgomery narrowly missed a double-double with 16 points and 9 assists as did Tina Charles with 11 points and 9 rebounds to go along with 4 assists. Caroline Doty broke out of her shooting slump hitting 4-of-7 three-pointers for 12 points. Tiffany Hayes rounded out the Huskies in double digits with 10 points, all in the first half, and had 4 steals.
Natasha Williams and Deirdre Naughton led the Blue Demons with a game-high 21 points and had 8 and 9 rebounds respectively. China Threatt chipped in with 12 points.
The Huskies started out quick getting out to a 5-0 lead in their first game at Gampel Pavilion since December 3. The Blue Demons responded with a 6-0 run. With the score 11-8 UConn, the Huskies went on an 11-0 run to take a 22-8 lead. The Blue Demons kept it close on the strength of 6 three-pointers but UConn had 10 steals and forced 16 turnovers to take a 47-32 lead at the half.
UConn pushed the lead to 23 points early in the second half but the Blue Demons wouldn’t go away as they responded with a 10-3 run to cut the lead to 13 points at 66-53. UConn held strong though as they responded with an 8-0 run to hold the Blue Demons off.
With a matchup with the No. 2 North Carolina Tar Heels looming on the horizon next Monday, maybe the Huskies were looking past the Blue Demons and Saturday’s opponent in Syracuse as they didn’t take good care of the ball as they committed 18 turnovers.
Whatever the case may be, they need to improve their ball handling no matter who the opponent is. I’m sure Geno Auriemma will have them working on that before Saturday’s matchup with the Orange at the XL Center at 2 PM. The game will be televised locally on CPTV and will also be available on SNY.
Notes and musings:
DePaul Blue Demons @ UConn Huskies 1.13.09 box score
The starters were the usual 5 suspects of Renee Montgomery, Caroline Doty, Kalana Greene, Maya Moore and Tina Charles.
Kara Wolters filled in for Meghan Culmo tonight on the CPTV broadcast. Culmo is away after the recent death of her mother-in-law. My condolences go out to the Culmo family and friends on their loss.
UConn entered tonight’s game vs. DePaul as one of only four teams nationally remaining team nationally without a loss at 15-0. The other remaining teams without a loss are Auburn, North Carolina and Kansas State.
UConn enters Tuesday’s game vs. DePaul leading the nation in the following categories:
- Scoring Offense ……………………………………88.4 ppg (1st)
- Scoring Margin…………………………………..+35.2 ppg (1st)
- Field Goal % ………………………………………………54.3 (1st)
- Assists Per Game ………………………………….22.9 apg (1st)
- Assist/TO Ratio ………………………………….+1.69 a/to (1st)
Maya Moore hit the 100th 3-pointer of her career tonight. It took her just 54 games.
She is also just 29 points away (971) from 1.000 in her career.
The Huskies shot 46.7% (28-60) from the floor while the Blue Demons shot 35.9% (23-64).
UConn had 19 assists on their 28 made baskets.
Both teams had 39 rebounds.
DePaul wasn’t much better with the ball as they had 22 turnovers.
The Huskies were an atrocious 59.1% (13-22) from the charity stripe.
UConn finished with 12 steals in the game.
The Huskies have 24 consecutive regular season games and 32 straight at home.
