People are going to say that this was just one game and you shouldn’t read too much into it. They’ll remind you that Syracuse was without Frank Howard. That UConn made some bonkers threes and can’t expect that kind of performance every night. That Eric Cobb’s double-double was a mere aberration.
It’s possible that all of that is correct. It also doesn’t matter.
The headline is that UConn beat rival Syracuse, 83-76, on Thursday in the semifinals of the 2K Empire Classic at Madison Square Garden. The Huskies will face Iowa Friday night in the championship game.
UConn beat Syracuse.
UConn beat Syracuse.
UConn beat Syracuse.
UConn beat Syracuse.
Read that a few more times.
You know the laundry list of UConn woes from the past few years. Back-to-back losing seasons, the injuries, the fights among the fan base about Kevin Ollie, a team that often looked uninspired. For two hours on Thursday, that all went away. Everything was right again.
“They had a look the last couple days that they couldn’t wait to get out there and play,” said UConn coach Dan Hurley, maybe having no idea how strange the concept of a UConn team that actually wants to play has become. “These guys got what they deserved: a great moment at the Garden.”
Remember those UConn teams that would get out and run better than anyone in the country?
Enter Jalen Adams and Alterique Gilbert, just 14 seconds into the game. Gilbert found Adams ahead of the pack for an alley-oop dunk to get the scoring started. Yeah, UConn only had eight total fast-break points for the game, but their constant pressure rattled Syracuse offensively and allowed the Huskies to consistently get shots off before the Orange’s 2-3 zone could set up. Hurley said later that that was the game plan.
Remember those UConn teams with guards who always seemed to hit the big shot?
Re-enter Adams and Gilbert, who hit a pair of threes on back-to-back possessions down the stretch to build a tenuous four-point lead back up to 10. UConn shot 12-21 (57.1%) from three for the game and Gilbert went 4-5.
Remember those UConn teams with bigs who could just bully the other team?
Enter…Eric Cobb? He had 13 points and 13 rebounds, and inspired Jim Boeheim to say this about him:
Boeheim: [Cobb] made our guys look like kids.
— Russell Steinberg (@Russ_Steinberg) November 16, 2018
And from Hurley:
“You saw the full display of what [Cobb] could do offensively. He could pass it, he was spraying it around from the high post, he was scoring around the basket, he shot a rhythm three… Eric’s a guy who could really catapult this year.”
This just felt right. UConn didn’t run Syracuse off the court, but it didn’t have to. It played a mostly good game, except for maybe an eight-minute stretch in the first half, when every Husky with a student ID had two fouls, and a couple little spurts in the second, and the UConn crowd was into it for 40 minutes.
It was the shot in the arm that the fanbase needed. On the heels of two dreadful seasons and the cratering of a football program that no longer has an excuse to exist, UConn fans have been among the most demoralized in the country.
Fans now have a reason to buy tickets. A reason to tune into CBS Sports Network at 9 p.m. on a Wednesday to watch the team in Tulsa. With no win-loss expectations heading into this year, that’s about all you could have asked for.
Hurley did ask for one more thing, though: Even more fans in the stands for the title game. You can still buy tickets here.
It’s easy to get ahead of yourself after watching that game and say UConn’s a tournament team and to even go further and say the program is back to being a consistent championship contender. That may end up being true, but for now, let’s just enjoy this.
UConn beat Syracuse. Here’s a GIF:
Dan Hurley and Jalen Adams chest bump on repeat pic.twitter.com/5ZcqURcyhx
— Daniel Connolly (@DanielVConnolly) November 16, 2018
