On Thursday night, the Lady Huskies beat the Georgetown Hoyas by the final score of 84-26. UCONN was once again led by Charde Houston, who scored 14 pts on 6 for 6 shooting. Tina Charles bounced back from two dismal performances adding 14 pts and 7 rebounds. Renee Montgomery rounded out the Lady Huskies in double figures with 11 points.

Notes and observations from the game:

• Starters were Montgomery, Thomas, Greene, Charles and Houston.
• The game against the Hoyas was a homecoming for UCONN Asst. Coach Jamelle Elliot and Freshman Kaili McClaren. Jamelle needed 35 tickets for her family and friends while McClaren needed 135 tickets.
• Mel Thomas actually did not play the entire 1st half for the first time this season. She sat out for about a minute.
• Brittany Hunter continues her impressive points per minute, scoring 9 pts in 8 minutes tonight. As evidenced by the final score, this was a good game for Brittany to rest her troublesome knee.
• UCONN ended the first half on a 23-0 run to lead 55-12 at the half. They shot 62.5% in the 1st half and 51.6% for the game.
• Kristin Phillips did not make the trip for the second straight game. She was left behind by Coach Geno Auriemma, who is not happy with her practice habits still.
• Cassie Kerns scored her first points of the season.
• All 12 Huskies who played scored.
• Coach Geno Auriemma is now 5 wins from 600 in his Hall of Fame coaching career.

The Huskies move to 6-0 on the season and will return to action on December 18th when they travel to Virginia to take on the Lady Cavaliers. They are off until then as they break for final exams. The game will be a homecoming of sorts for Geno Auriemma as he began his coaching career at Virginia.

Technorati: UCONN Huskies, Geno Auriemma, Georgetown Hoyas, Charde Houston, Tina Charles

On Wednesday, Dec 6th, The UCONN Men’s basketball team beat their namesake from Northeastern by a final score of 81-53. UCONN was led by Jeff Adrien’s fifth double-double of the season. He had 18 pts and 12 rebounds. Four other UCONN Huskies scored in double figures: Doug Wiggins with 14 pts, AJ Price with 13 pts, Jerome Dyson with 11 pts and Marcus Johnson with 10 pts. The win was the 8th straight for the UCONN Huskies.

Notes and Observations:

• The starters were Price, Johnson, Dyson, Thabeet, and Adrien
• Coach Jim Calhoun picked up his first technical foul of the season when he was arguing a goaltending call. Hasheem Thabeet had blocked a shot that was ruled goaltending and Calhoun argued it was a block. Television replays showed it was clearly goaltending. It could have also been a ploy by Calhoun to get the troops to play a little better.
• Most of the first half was played at a crawl, as the Northeastern Huskies slowed the ball down. The score at half was 35-24.
• Doug Wiggins, 14 pts, was in double figures for the third straight game.
• Jeff Adriens double-double was his fifth in eight games this season.
• At one point, UCONN was being outblocked by a smaller Northeastern team but finished with a 8-7 advantage in block shots.
• Thabeet had 3 blocks in the game and now has 41 in 8 games this season.
• Marcus Williams was in the crowd and was also interviewed at half time on the television broadcast.

The UCONN men will return to the court on Sunday, December 17th against St Mary’s (CA) at the Hartford Civic Center as they break for exams til then.

@ Georgetown 7:30 PM. The game will be broadcast on CPTV in the Connecticut area.

Well since this is the first year that I have really devoted to writing about the UCONN Football team, I decided that I will announce the Random Thoughts Players of the Year for the UCONN Huskies and also the game of the year.

There will be 4 categories: Offense, Defense, Special Teams and Game of the Year.
OFFENSIVE Player of the Year:

At first, I didn’t really think that the Huskies really had anybody who stood out on offense. But after discussions with a few people, they all said the same person and I agree with them. I have decided that redshirt Freshman running back Donald Brown II is the Random Thoughts Offensive Player of the Year.

For the season, Brown rushed for 896 yards on 161 carries reaching the endzone for 7 touchdowns. He also caught the ball 13 times for 66 yards and 2 touchdowns. Brown had four 100 yard rushing games and 3 of those came in Big East games.

Defensive Player of the Year:

There were a lot of worthy candidates for Defensive Player of the Year including Dan Davis, Rhema Fuller, Ryan Henegan and Lindsey Witten. But I felt as though Danny Lansanah was the Defensive Player of the Year.

Lansanah led the team in tackles with 99, 45 of them being solo. He also tied for the team lead with 4 interceptions and had 2 sacks on the season. He is expected back to lead the Huskies on defense for 2007.

Special Teams Player of the Year:

This one is a no brainer. Larry Taylor is my Special Teams Player of the Year.

Larry Taylor’s speed and elusiveness made teams kick the ball away from him. On the season, he returned 20 punts for 255 yards, taking one of them to the endzone for a touchdown. He also returned 11 kickoffs for 279 yards. He ended up missing the last 3 games of the season with concussion-like symptoms.
Game of the Year:

This one is also a no brainer. For those of you who were at the UCONN-Pittsburgh game, you witnessed one of the greatest comebacks in UCONN football history. Down 14 in the final quarter, QB DJ Hernandez rallied UCONN to tie the game with 2 seconds left and then go onto win it in overtime.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=
JYp7kVOUN-8[/youtube]

Players to watch next season:

On the offensive side of the ball, the player to watch is Donald Brown II. He will most likely be the starter at running back for the Huskies next season. While he did play in all 12 games this past season, he was not the featured back until 8th game of the season against Rutgers.

On the defensive side of the ball, the player to watch is Lindsey Witten. As a true freshman, Witten had 39 tackles and 3.5 sacks. Although he is 6’4″ 225 lbs, his speed allowed him to get around some of the bigger offensive lineman. I’d expect him to come into next season with a lot more bulk and even more speed.

Technorati: UCONN Huskies, College Football, Randy Edsall, Larry Taylor, Danny Lansanah, Donald Brown II

The University of Connecticut announced on Tuesday its first class of women’s basketball to be inducted into “Huskies of Honor” recognition program. The “Huskies of Honor” is designed to recognize the top players and coaches from the men’s and women’s basketball teams.

The inaugural class consists of five former National Players of the Year, who were also All-Americans, and five other All-Americans. Also, Geno Auriemma, the current women’s coach will be honored as well. The five former National Players of the Year are Rebecca Lobo (1995), Jennifer Rizzotti (1996), Kara Wolters (1997), Sue Bird (2002), and Diana Taurasi (2003 and 2004). The other five inductees are Kerry Bascom, Nykesha Sales, Shea Ralph, Svetlana Abrsoimova, and Swin Cash.

They all will be honored following the Dec 21st game versus Colorado State at Gampel Pavilion. Only Shea Ralph and Svetlana Abrsoimova will not be present due to previous commitments.

Congratulations go out to the 11 inductees.

Technorati: UCONN Huskies, Geno Auriemma, Women’s Basketball, Diana Taurasi

On Tuesday from the General Manager Meetings in Orlando, FL, Boston Red Sox GM Theo Epstein announced the Red Sox have signed J.D Drew to a 5 yr $70 million dollar contract. The contract will become official one Drew passes a physical.

Also its being reported that the Red Sox have signed former Devil Ray and Dodgers shortstop, Julio Lugo, to a 4 yr $36 million dollar contract.

These two signings are key for the Red Sox. J.D. Drew provides the Sox with another big bat who can protect Manny and Big Papi in the lineup. That statement being made if the Sox don’t trade Manny. If the Sox do trade Manny, he still gives them a big bat if he can stay healthy. Drew also is an excellent defensive fielder. He is basically a center fielder in right field. He may have a little trouble adjusting to the big right field in Fenway but once he adapts I think he will be fine. I also think if he stays healthy, his bat will help the Sox out. Last season, he hit 20 hrs and drove in a team high 100 runs.

Julio Lugo marks the 4th different shortstop to play for the Sox since they traded away Nomar Garciaparra during the 2004 season. His defense is not as good as Alex Gonzalez’s or Edgar Renteria’s but he has a good bat something which the Red Sox haven’t had since Garciaparra. The Sox have been interested in Lugo for the past year and finally have gotten their man.

So right now this is what the lineup looks like:

1. Julio Lugo SS
2. Coco Crisp CF
3. David Ortiz DH
4. Manny Ramirez LF
5. J.D. Drew RF
6. Jason Varitek C
7. Kevin Youkilis 1B
8. Mike Lowell 3B
9. Dustin Pedroia 2B

A lot more projected power in the lineup next year. The key to this lineup though is still Manny. With Manny in the lineup and J.D. Drew batting behind him, opposing pitchers will have to pitch to Big Papi.

Now, we need to find a closer. Kudos to Theo Epstein for picking up two quality free agents. The Red Sox still have over 9 days to sign Japanese pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka as well.

Technorati: Boston Red Sox, J.D. Drew, Julio Lugo, Theo Epstein

vs Northeastern at 7:30 PM at Gampel Pavilion. The game is on Fox 61 and SNY in the Connecticut area

On Monday night Dec 4th, the UCONN Lady Huskies defeated the Crusaders of Holy Cross by the final score of 83-64. UCONN was led by Charde Houston’s 22 points, 6 rebounds and 4 steals. Also scoring in double figures for the Huskies were Renee Montgomery with 16 pts, Brittany Hunter with 12 pts, and Kalana Greene added 10 pts.

Holy Cross actually led for most of the first half, on 6 of 7 shooting from 3 pt land, until a 10-0 run put the Huskies up for good at the 4 minute mark of the first half. Both teams shot over 50% from the field in the first half.

Notes and observations:

• The starters for UCONN were Montgomery, Thomas, Greene, Charles, and Houston.
• Mel Thomas struggled from 3 pt land during the game going 1 for 5 and finishing with 9 points. Knowing Mel’s work ethic, I wouldn’t expect this to happen again.
• Kaili McClaren showed excellent range for a post player knocking down her first 3 pt shot of her young career. This bodes well for the Huskies as this may open up things down in the post later on.
• Kristin Phillips did not make the trip to Worcester. Coach Geno Auriemma has not been happy with her practices. This marks the third consecutive game she has not played in.
• Brittany Hunter’s 12 pts were scored in only 11 minutes played. At the end of the game, her knee looked to be giving her problems or she was just plain tired.
• Holy Cross shot 100% from the free throw line. The Huskies only got to the line 9 times hitting only 5 of them to continue their poor free throw shooting. This needs to improve as the Huskies get set to start the Big East portion of their schedule.
• The Huskies shot 67% from the field in the game.
• Geno Auriemma is now 6 wins away from 600 in his Hall of Fame coaching career.

Next up for the Lady Huskies is their first Big East game on the road @ Georgetown on Thursday, Dec 7th. This will be the last game until Dec 18th as they break for final exams.

Technorati: UCONN Huskies, Geno Auriemma, Charde Houston, Holy Cross