- Big 12 leaving UConn, Gonzaga behind in conference realignment will prove best for both in long run CBS Sports
- Big 12 held talks with Gonzaga, UConn, commissioner says – ESPN ESPN
- Big 12’s Yormark Shares What He Told Pac-12’s Kliavkoff After Pilfering League Sports Illustrated
- Dribble Handoff: UConn, Gonzaga among teams that would benefit from a basketball-first realignment plan CBS Sports
- Talks for Big 12 to add Gonzaga, UConn ‘no longer,’ commissioner says: Is that surprising? The Athletic
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Tag Archives: UConn
2023 Final Four: Evaluating UConn, Miami, San Diego State, FAU as March Madness heads to Houston – CBS Sports
- 2023 Final Four: Evaluating UConn, Miami, San Diego State, FAU as March Madness heads to Houston CBS Sports
- Final Four field is totally nutty, but UConn’s fifth men’s title won’t be a strange outcome at all Chicago Sun-Times
- Miami, San Diego State Join a Men’s Final Four That Is Missing the Top Seeds The Wall Street Journal
- 2023 Final Four odds, lines: UConn, San Diego State open as favorites, Huskies favored to win NCAA Tournament CBS Sports
- March Madness: Final Four schedule, games, TV times, announcers and more Yahoo Sports
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Top-Seeded Huskies, Marquette to Meet in BIG EAST Semifinals – University of Connecticut Athletics – UConn Huskies
- Top-Seeded Huskies, Marquette to Meet in BIG EAST Semifinals – University of Connecticut Athletics UConn Huskies
- Big East Tournament semifinal: UConn vs Marquette: What you need to know Hartford Courant
- 2023 Big East Tournament bracket: Schedule, scores, dates, location, updates, live stream for March Madness CBS Sports
- What are the keys to a Big East Conference tournament championship run for Villanova? Here are four big ones. The Philadelphia Inquirer
- UConn enters Big East tourney confident, on a 5-game winning streak FOX Sports
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David Borges: UConn men’s basketball makes big jump on our AP Top 25 ballot this week – CT Insider
- David Borges: UConn men’s basketball makes big jump on our AP Top 25 ballot this week CT Insider
- No. 4 Huskies to Host Xavier on Senior Night – University of Connecticut Athletics UConn Huskies
- With return of much-needed depth, UConn men have everything working for late push; notes from Saturday’s win at St. John’s Hartford Courant
- UConn’s Adama Sanogo claps back at ‘G League’ chants from St. John’s fans: ‘That’s cool, they lost’ NJ.com
- No. 18 Huskies Roll Over St. John’s At MSG – University of Connecticut Athletics UConn Huskies
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Providence men’s basketball coach has message for ‘spoiled’ UConn fans: ‘Don’t get arrogant with it’ – CT Insider
- Providence men’s basketball coach has message for ‘spoiled’ UConn fans: ‘Don’t get arrogant with it’ CT Insider
- ‘It’s not sustainable’: How everything caught up to No. 4 UConn women in loss to St. John’s and where the Huskies go from here Hartford Courant
- Providence vs. UConn – Men’s College Basketball Game Recap – February 22, 2023 ESPN
- 2023 BIG EAST Fan Guide: Villanova Women Go For 10 Straight, Georgetown Men Eye Repeat SwimSwam
- UConn men hit stride in second half, speed past Providence 87-69 in last on-campus game of season Hartford Courant
- View Full Coverage on Google News
UConn, lacking 7 healthy players, forced to postpone DePaul game
STORRS, Conn — The Big East game between No. 5 UConn and DePaul on Sunday at Gampel Pavilion in Storrs, Connecticut, has been postponed because the Huskies don’t have enough healthy players available to suit up, the conference said Friday.
The conference requires schools to suit up seven scholarship players for any game, and injuries have left the Huskies with just six active players, the school said.
UConn also was expected to be without head coach Geno Auriemma, who announced Thursday that he is taking some time off to recover from an illness.
Junior Aaliyah Edwards and freshman Ayanna Patterson were injured in UConn’s win at Xavier on Thursday. They join sophomore Caroline Ducharme, sophomore Azzi Fudd, junior Paige Bueckers and freshman Ice Brady on the inactive list.
Edwards suffered what was described alternately as a right foot or ankle injury in the first half of the Huskies’ 73-37 victory, diving over some courtside seats for a loose ball. It was not immediately clear when or how Patterson was hurt.
The school said it would not release any further details Friday night.
“At UConn, the health and wellbeing of our student-athletes will always be our top priority,” David Benedict, the school’s athletic director, said in a statement. “Our women’s basketball program has unfortunately been affected by an unprecedented number of injuries this season. While it’s unfortunate that we need to postpone Sunday’s game, it’s the right call to protect the safety of our student-athletes. We will work with the Big East and DePaul on options to reschedule the game.”
Bueckers and Brady are out for the season with knee injuries.
Fudd, the Huskies’ leading scorer, is expected to return shortly from a knee injury that has kept her on the bench since she was injured in a collision with Edwards during a Dec. 4 loss to Notre Dame. She has participated in warmups during the last three games as part of her rehab.
Ducharme has missed two games while in concussion protocol after suffering an injury in practice.
The Huskies currently available to play include guards Nika Muhl, Lou Lopez Senechal and Ines Bettencourt, and forwards Aubrey Griffin, Dorka Juhasz and Amari DeBerry.
Auriemma has missed four games this season due to illness, and it is not clear when he might return.
“It’s been an extremely difficult month for me, and I’ve been feeling under the weather and run down,” Auriemma said in a statement Thursday. “I thought I was ready to return, but I need a little more time. I’m going to take a step back to focus on my health and will return when I feel ready.”
Despite the injuries, the Huskies have won six straight.
The school says those with tickets to Sunday’s game will be able to use them when the game is rescheduled.
UConn is next scheduled to play at St. John’s on Wednesday, while DePaul is scheduled to host Villanova that evening.
UConn, lacking 7 healthy players, forced to postpone DePaul game
STORRS, Conn — The Big East game between No. 5 UConn and DePaul on Sunday at Gampel Pavilion in Storrs, Connecticut, has been postponed because the Huskies don’t have enough healthy players available to suit up, the conference said Friday.
The conference requires schools to suit up seven scholarship players for any game, and injuries have left the Huskies with just six active players, the school said.
UConn also was expected to be without head coach Geno Auriemma, who announced Thursday that he is taking some time off to recover from an illness.
Junior Aaliyah Edwards and freshman Ayanna Patterson were injured in UConn’s win at Xavier on Thursday. They join sophomore Caroline Ducharme, sophomore Azzi Fudd, junior Paige Bueckers and freshman Ice Brady on the inactive list.
Edwards suffered what was described alternately as a right foot or ankle injury in the first half of the Huskies’ 73-37 victory, diving over some courtside seats for a loose ball. It was not immediately clear when or how Patterson was hurt.
The school said it would not release any further details Friday night.
“At UConn, the health and wellbeing of our student-athletes will always be our top priority,” David Benedict, the school’s athletic director, said in a statement. “Our women’s basketball program has unfortunately been affected by an unprecedented number of injuries this season. While it’s unfortunate that we need to postpone Sunday’s game, it’s the right call to protect the safety of our student-athletes. We will work with the Big East and DePaul on options to reschedule the game.”
Bueckers and Brady are out for the season with knee injuries.
Fudd, the Huskies’ leading scorer, is expected to return shortly from a knee injury that has kept her on the bench since she was injured in a collision with Edwards during a Dec. 4 loss to Notre Dame. She has participated in warmups during the last three games as part of her rehab.
Ducharme has missed two games while in concussion protocol after suffering an injury in practice.
The Huskies’ currently available to play include guards Nika Muhl, Lou Lopez Senechal, Ines Bettencourt and forwards Aubrey Griffin, Dorka Juhasz and Amari DeBerry.
Auriemma has missed four games this season due to illness, and it is not clear when he might return.
“It’s been an extremely difficult month for me, and I’ve been feeling under the weather and run down,” Auriemma said in a statement Thursday. “I thought I was ready to return, but I need a little more time. I’m going to take a step back to focus on my health and will return when I feel ready.”
Despite the injuries, the Huskies have won six straight.
The school says those with tickets to Sunday’s game will be able to use them when the game is rescheduled.
UConn is next scheduled to play at St. John’s on Wednesday, while DePaul is scheduled to host Villanova that evening.
College basketball rankings: A shakeup after Xavier’s upset of UConn
A new year has dawned, and with it a new season. College hoops has officially pivoted from nonconference play — replete with easy buy games, titillating challenges, and tournaments played inside casinos and at tropical locales — to conference play, during which teams must travel through frigid temperatures and try win games in hostile cauldrons. That means no more hiding, and no more smooth sailing for anyone. It’s nothing but frigid, choppy waters ahead.
So this might be the last time all season that I can say there was not much movement on my ballot. Here, then, for the first time in 2023, I present the correct order of the top 25 teams in men’s college basketball, as submitted to the Associated Press on Sunday night:
Seth Davis’ Top 25 for Monday, Jan. 2
Dropped out: North Carolina (16), Kentucky (19), Memphis (21)
Almost Famous: Auburn, Florida Atlantic, Illinois, Missouri, Providence, Saint Mary’s, Utah State
Notes on the votes
• Those of you who follow my rankings closely (and you know who you are) understand that I consider far more than just whether a team won or lost games the previous week. I put added weight on whom it played, how it played, and most of all, where it played. We all know it’s really, really hard to win on the road. Conversely, that means a top-25 team should win at home, especially if it’s against a team that’s ranked lower or not at all.
I had three results inside my top five from last Saturday that I needed to consider: UConn’s 83-73 loss at Xavier, Kansas’ 69-67 home win over Oklahoma State, and Arizona’s 69-60 win at Arizona State. I almost left UConn at No. 2, because there is no shame in losing to a good team on the road, and the Huskies have been arguably the best team in the country this season. I was compelled, however, to bump Arizona up a couple of spots because its win was decisive, and it happened against a good team on the road. Arizona also had a neutral-court win over Indiana and a home win over Tennessee in December, which pushed its 81-66 loss at Utah on Dec. 1 deeper into the rearview mirror. Most teams will have a bad game once in a while, and that loss was to a conference opponent on the road.
As for Kansas, I generally don’t believe in punishing teams after wins, but the Jayhawks were playing at home against an unranked team in Oklahoma State that has lost this season to Southern Illinois and UCF, and they darn near lost. I don’t consider moving a team down one slot much of a punishment anyway, but the Jayhawks dropped because of my decision to leapfrog Arizona.
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• I’m guessing there is still some confusion as to why I have Houston at No. 8 when the Cougars were No. 3 in the AP poll last week and are No. 1 in the NET, KenPom and BartTorvik. The answer lies in their resume. Houston’s best win was at Virginia. A fabulous road win, no doubt, but Virginia also lost its next game at Miami. Other than that, Houston’s best win came in Fort Worth over unranked Saint Mary’s. It also has several wins over unranked teams that were uncomfortably close, including Saturday’s 71-65 home win over UCF. It’s notable that Houston is No. 7 in Kevin Pauga’s KPI rankings, which is based solely on results, whereas the other metrics are intended to be predictive. There are also some head-to-head results to consider. Houston lost at home to Alabama, so shouldn’t the Cougars be ranked behind the Crimson Tide? And Alabama lost to Gonzaga in Birmingham later that week, so shouldn’t the Tide be behind the Zags? Given that Houston is by far the best team in its conference, I expect this team will keep winning and rise in the rankings accordingly, but that’s why I have the Cougars where they are. Metrics are useful, but they’re not gospel.
• To expand on my point about the metrics, let’s look at some teams where the rankings seem to be way off, for better and worse. Is there anyone who would argue that Miami doesn’t deserve to be ranked? Well, the Hurricanes are 33rd in the NET, 37th on KenPom, and 50th on BartTorvik. Yet, KPI has them at No. 9. They shouldn’t be ranked that high, but in this case, KPI is much closer to accurate.
Then there are the two teams that the metrics love to hate: Wisconsin (44 NET, 42 KenPom, 49 BartTorvik) and Providence (57 NET, 44 KenPom, 58 BartTorvik). KPI is split on this one – it has Wisconsin at 12, and Providence at 64. This is all because the metrics do not like teams that win a lot of close games. Yet, when they calculate the standings and the Quad records, a win counts the same whether it comes by one or 100. By the way, Providence has a big game Wednesday night at home against UConn. The Huskies won’t be in a great mood, but it’s not often you get to play a top-five team on your home court. The Friars would do well to at least pass the eye test.
On the flip side, the metrics are smitten with West Virginia (13 NET, 20 KenPom, 13 BartTorvik, 25 KPI), even though the Mountaineers’ best win was at Pittsburgh and they just lost at Kansas State in their Big 12 opener. Auburn also has strong metrics and continues to be ranked in the AP top 25 even though the Tigers’ resume is very meh. Their best win was on a neutral court over Northwestern, and they have losses in December to Memphis (neutral) and USC (road).
• The big winner this week, of course, was Xavier. That was an amazing win the Musketeers pulled off Saturday under immense pressure. The two things that stood out to me were Jack Nunge’s 15 points, three rebounds and three assists while battling a virus. Most people don’t want to get out of bed when they’re that sick, much less play a high-level basketball game, but Nunge pulled through like a champ. The other was the contributions off the bench by 6-7 senior forward Jerome Hunter, a Glue Guy who played for Sean Miller’s brother, Archie, at Indiana. Xavier is a really good offensive team but only a so-so-defensive one. Hunter gives this team the toughness it needs at that end of the floor. He will become an extremely valuable piece during the dog days of February.
• I’ve been more supportive of North Carolina and Kentucky than my fellow voters, but those teams made it easy for me to drop them after losing to Pitt and Missouri, respectively. Speaking of Missouri, I gave the Tigers a hard look, not only for their win over Kentucky but also their evisceration of Illinois in the Braggin’ Rights game. Frankly, I’m not quite sure just how good those teams are, and the Tigers had a very suspect nonconference schedule otherwise, so I decided to wait just a little bit longer before putting a number next to their name. But if they keep playing like this, it’s only a matter of time.
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• Memphis’ loss at Tulane on Sunday opened up another spot. I’ve been stumping for Creighton the last couple of weeks — I even gave the Jays a coveted Buy-Plus rating in my annual Hoop Thoughts Stock Report — so I gave them the final spot even though it doesn’t take much to beat Butler and DePaul at home. My point all along was that the reason Creighton plummeted so badly was because Ryan Kalkbrenner was out, but now that he’s back, I expect them to surge again. They’ve got Seton Hall at home and UConn on the road this week, to be followed by Xavier (road) and Providence (home) next week. We’ll find out soon enough whether my faith in this team is justified.
(Top photo of Xavier’s Colby Jones: Dylan Buell / Getty Images)
UConn freshman Ice Brady out for season with dislocated patella
UConn women’s basketball freshman forward Ice Brady will miss the season after suffering a dislocated patella in her right knee, the second season-ending knee injury the Huskies have experienced heading into the 2022-23 campaign.
The injury occurred during practice Friday, and Brady underwent surgery Tuesday and will begin rehab Wednesday.
“Anytime any player has an injury, it’s so heartbreaking because they put so much time and effort into being the best player they can be,” coach Geno Auriemma said in a statement. “When that’s taken away — regardless of how long they’re out — to not be able to play is unfortunate. Ice has made so much progress since she’s been here and I’m really confident that when she does come back, she’s going to be better and more impactful than she already has been.”
Brady, a 6-foot-3 post player from San Diego, is one of three incoming freshmen for the Huskies, ranked No. 5 in her class per espnW’s rankings, one spot behind UConn classmate Ayanna Patterson. After 2020-21 Player of the Year Paige Bueckers’ ACL injury in August, Auriemma also brought in Inês Bettencourt from Portugal to add another guard.
UConn — ranked No. 6 in ESPN’s and AP’s preseason polls — will now have 10 healthy players for the season, with Bueckers and Brady sidelined for 2022-23.
In addition to losing Bueckers and now Brady to injury, Christyn Williams, Olivia Nelson-Ododa and Evina Westbrook all left for the WNBA. Returners Aaliyah Edwards, Dorka Juhász, Azzi Fudd and Caroline Ducharme will help carry the load for a depleted Huskies team, which is looking for its first national title since 2016 and its 12th overall.
Duke Blue Devils men, UConn Huskies women to compete in Jimmy V Classic college basketball events
The matchups for the 2022 men’s and women’s Jimmy V Classic college basketball events were announced Thursday, highlighted by Duke on the men’s side and a pair of potential top-10 matchups on the women’s side.
The men’s doubleheader will take place Dec. 6 at Madison Square Garden, with Duke facing Iowa and Texas playing Illinois. The women’s games will be hosted on campus sites Dec. 4: UConn at Notre Dame and Virginia Tech at Tennessee.
The coming season marks the first time since 1980 that Duke will be coached by someone other than Mike Krzyzewski, with Jon Scheyer taking over that role. The Blue Devils bring in the nation’s No. 1-ranked recruiting class and are ranked No. 5 in ESPN’s latest Way-Too-Early Top 25.
The Longhorns and the Fighting Illini also are ranked in the Way-Too-Early Top 25. Chris Beard and Texas bring back three starters from last season’s 22-win team, while also welcoming two five-star freshmen and elite transfer Tyrese Hunter from Iowa State. Illinois lost All-American Kofi Cockburn, but it landed impact transfers Terrence Shannon Jr. (Texas Tech) and Matthew Mayer (Baylor), as well as top-25 recruit Skyy Clark.
Both men’s games will air on ESPN.
On the women’s side, all four teams are ranked in the top 11 of ESPN’s most recent Way-Too-Early Top 25.
UConn is coming off a national championship game appearance and returns stars Paige Bueckers and Azzi Fudd, while Notre Dame brings back most of its contributors and hit the portal for Texas transfer Lauren Ebo.
Virginia Tech should compete for an ACC championship with the return of conference Player of the Year Elizabeth Kitley, and Tennessee loaded up in the transfer portal and is receiving preseason top-five hype.
UConn’s trip to Notre Dame will be broadcast on ABC, and Virginia Tech vs. Tennessee will air on ESPN2.
Named for legendary coach Jim Valvano, the Jimmy V Classic raises money and awareness for the V Foundation for Cancer Research. To date, ESPN has helped raise more than $155 million for the V Foundation. Last year set a record, with 2021’s V Week raising $13.35 million.