Time constraints prevent me from photoshopping Tyler Olander’s head onto Eminem’s body, but I need you to know I considered it.
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A month ago — simpler times, really — on December 2nd, Shabazz Napier retrieved the ball off a miss and found the bottom of the net as the backboard turned red, defeating then #15 Florida in front of a raucous Gampel Pavilion crowd. It was an amazing high point that earned the Huskies their 8th consecutive win, and another bullet point on an early season resumé that also included wins over major conference opponents such as Indiana and Maryland.
At that time it appeared that UConn had found their recipe for success. They were never going to be the biggest team (at least not against real opponents). Rebounding would always be a challenge. But they were fast, played hard, and could shoot the lights out.
Several weeks later, the identical group of players walked out of the XL Center locker room for a second half against Stanford in which they shot so poorly, that men, women and children openly wept in the stands (maybe). It seemed an aberration. UConn had been riding an incredible hot streak from three-point range for most of the season, culminating with a 56% shooting performance from deep against Maine. One half of poor shooting was certainly not indicative of their true talent level.
However, as the graph above clearly shows, when the shots stopped falling for the Huskies in the second half of the Stanford game, they had an awfully tough time getting it back, and an awfully tough time winning without it.
On the season, Shabazz Napier is hitting threes at a rate that far exceeds his career average. He’s at 48% this year compared to 39.8% last season and 36.2% his freshman through junior seasons. Ryan Boatright and DeAndre Daniels are also outshooting their career marks (although Boatright is attempting significantly less threes per game than last season). And senior Niels Giffey has gone so insane that he has been preemptively banned from the baseball Hall of Fame. Despite a drop-off in attempts lately, he is still shooting 61.8% on the season, compared to 29.4% last season.
The rise in individual shooting percentages can partially (maybe mostly) be explained away by the seldom-heard idiom, college players get better the longer they play college basketball. Crazy, right?
Still, it’s become very obvious that the best defense you can play against this UConn team is to limit their clean looks from deep and force them to either abandon the arc or launch bad shots — hence, the dip in percentage in games where the Huskies did not play well.
The aberration in all of this is the early season matchup against Boston College. It was a generally terrible game to watch, as neither team shot well. But it proved how UConn can win even if the threes aren’t falling. The Huskies went 3-14 from deep in that game. Both teams shot just under 40% from the floor. The difference in that game turned out to be UConn forcing a few more BC turnovers, hitting their free throws, and not getting destroyed on the glass. All of those speak to focus and effort.
During their recent slide, focus and effort are two of the last attributes you would assign to this UConn squad. On a team captained by the tenacious Napier and coached by a man — Kevin Ollie — that willed his team to compete every game in a season where they barred from tournament play, a lack of effort seems unthinkable.
After their redeeming win over Harvard on Wednesday night, Napier told A Dime Back’s Meghan Bard that tendonitis in his knee had been hampering him since the Stanford game. An injury to their leader could certainly explain the puzzling nature of UConn’s December. As goes Napier, so go the Huskies. On a lesser scale, the same may be true of sophomore guard Omar Calhoun who has seen his minutes, and his field goal percentage, plummet this season following multiple offseason surgeries.
As a result, Ollie has been mixing and matching Calhoun, Giffey and Lasan Kromah in an effort to wring some production out of the third guard spot. Coupled with post play that can generously be labeled as nonexistent, if not counter-productive, and UConn’s rotation is in a state of flux that may also be making it difficult for the team to truly gel on the court.
Now at 12-3 on the season (0-2 in conference play), this UConn team has found its identity. We’ll call it “Bazz and friends.” They have played themselves into a position where, if Napier can be the best player on the court, they’ll probably win. If Shabazz struggles, gets complacent, or gets injured, UConn will be on the wrong end of some games that look awfully similar to the drubbing they received at Houston and at SMU.
They have yet to find consistency. Every team is in some ways a work in progress. Some of the greatest teams in UConn history have struggled to really hit their stride until late in the season. But make no mistake, this year’s squad is not packing the kind of talent that allows for that learning curve. And frankly, on a team full of juniors and seniors, they shouldn’t need it.
Ollie’s most crucial task, as this season builds to its crescendo, will be to figure out how to run an offense that can capitalize on the unique skills of UConn’s undersized lineup, while motivating his guys to play with passion and intensity even if the shots aren’t falling. This team could accomplish great things, but it needs leadership both on the court and on the sidelines.
It’s also worth noting that they really need to work on keeping other teams out of transition. Houston was KILLING them in transition. As soon as they got in front of the ball, forcing Houston to set up plays, the D shined.