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A blog on UConn women's basketball.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

UConn happy with win but not effort against Seton Hall

UConn's standard of success and high-quality play is at such an elite level that even a 21-point victory can be a cause of discontent.

Playing disjointed and lethargic for long stretches, UConn was never in danger of losing to Seton Hall but was left longing for a better performance than the one it put forth on Tuesday night.

"I don't remember the last time someone made 10 3's on us, so credit to them for making some tough shots," UConn coach Geno Auriemma said of Seton Hall which had a season-high 11 3-pointers. "Except for a 7-10 minute stretch at the beginning of the second half where it began to look like the Connecticut team that we are used to seeing, the other 25-30 minutes it was more about Seton Hall than it was about Connecticut.

"I think it also illustrates that when you make shots like we did in the second half, we made free throws, it covers up a lot of things. This was one of those nights where we didn't turn the ball over, we shot great from the free throw line, we played well for a stretch of minutes in the second half but it wasn't one of those games where you feel like you got everything accomplished that you wanted to get accomplished."

With the Seton Hall game sandwiched between the Huskies' impressive win over Notre Dame and Saturday's game at Georgetown, it was only natural that there would be a bit of a letdown by the Huskies.

"It's a natural occurrence, especially when one day you are playing a game that was for first place in the league and the next day you are playing the team that is tied for last in the league," Auriemma said. "That's probably when a thin bench shows itself, because if you were consistently playing eight or nine players you would be able to kind of keep running people out there and not having to tax people mentally as much. Do I understand it? 'Yes.' I just thought that we played, we won and its time to move on. But it wasn't anything that we can go back tomorrow and look at as something that was really, really helpful to us for the most part. I understand it. I know these things happen. It didn't matter what the final score was. Us winning by 20, 30 or 40 - it just didn't play out right. There were just too many moments, too many minutes, too many long stretches of just ok basketball. On to the next one. We have two left, do the same thing we've done all year long. Saturday/Monday, one on the road, one at home. It seems like the last couple of years we've had a million of those and I hope this Saturday/Monday go as well as a whole bunch of the other Saturday/Mondays have gone."

If DePaul loses to Louisville on Wednesday, UConn will clinch a share of the Big East title. If DePaul wins out, UConn can still secure at least a share of the program's 19th Big East regular-season title and the top seed in the Big East tournament with a win at Georgetown on Saturday or victory against Syracuse in Monday's regular-season finale.

"It was probably not a great thing to talk about with some of our guys, because I brought it up something the other day that the freshman can enjoy something that was meaningful for them, that they had something to do, which is hopefully win a regular season championship in the toughest league in the country," Auriemma said with a sly grin. "If they did what I think they are capable of doing and go undefeated in the league, at this time when seven teams in the league are in the top 25, that would be something really, really meaningful if they can pull it off. They were so inspired and jacked up that they came out tonight and just let me know `We've got our own agenda. We're not really interested in what you have to say all of the time.' Saturday and Monday will be interesting."

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