Suffering a mild concussion in the first half of Wednesday's game against Towson forced junior guard Caroline Doty to take some time off from basketball. Doty, who looked out of sorts in the Towson game and at times during the World Vision Classic, seemed to have returned with a much better frame of mind.

UConn coach Geno Auriemma raved about Doty since she returned to practice on Sunday and her teammates also spoke about how much better she had been playing since returning to the court.

"I think she just needed a couple of days off," Auriemma said. "I think having Thursday, Friday, Saturday off did her a world of good. It is not easy being her when you think about it she hasn't caught a break in a long time and I don't care how tough you are and what everybody says about you, there is only so much somebody can take before they say 'why do I have to go through this.' Most kids come here for two hours, they go to practice, they go to the training room get a bag of ice and they go eat. She has to do 17 things, she has so much she has to do to get ready for practice, after practice ... After a while I can imagine it just gets to her so every little thing that happens is one more thing and 'why, why, why.' So I think those three days away did her a world of good."

Doty has tried to maintain a positive attitude through it all but in recent games it was evident that she was putting a lot of pressure on herself leading to uncharacteristic sloppy plays from her.

"Taking the two days off was kind of an eye opener," Doty said. "It was like 'listen, calm down you have five more months of this. I came back to practice and I felt pretty good and I am very excited for tomorrow.  I think I was putting a little too much pressure on myself to try to do too much."

Auriemma recently had a heart to heart with Doty about the way she was going about her business and he even went as far as suggesting that Doty's concussion was the result of bad karma.

"When you get frustrated, you are not thinking clearly and everything else is going wrong," Auriemma said. "I told her 'the reason you fell on your head is because you are in a bad mood, you have a bad attitude right now. You have bad vibes, bad mojo.' Otherwise you would have just fell down, got up, make your free throw. Right now there is a bad moon rising over you and you need a couple days off. In her mind she is like I don't want to go through this anymore so just take three days off. It is like the guy who can't play golf, take two weeks off and quit, go play tennis. I told her take three days off and quit, she had fun with it and knew that once she got her head cleared, she'd be all right and she is. Playing bad for her, it just kills her. When you have been waiting so long to play and then you can't do some of the things that you used to be able to do, it is just eating her alive.

"She has had two great days the last two days. Her mind is different, you can tell by the look in her eyes and because of that the ball is going where it is supposed to go, shots are going in, defensively she knows where she is going, her mouth is saying the right things at the right time to the right guys. It's like a quarterback in the huddle. She has control of the situation now for about a week or so."