Time will tell what caliber of players that freshmen Molly Bent and Kyla Irwin will turn out to be but there is no questioning that when it comes to first-year players who "get it" these two would definitely qualify.

Bent and Irwin knew that UConn coach Geno Auriemma didn't win a record 11 national championships by letting his new batch of recruits kick back and learn things at their own rate. He sets certain expectations and it is up to them to meet them and not for him to set the bar lower.

With Bent being coached by her father as an eighth grader through her sophomore season at Barnstable (Mass.) High and Irwin's coach in both volleyball and basketball at State College (Pa.) High being her mother and Branford High School Hall of Famer Bethany (Collins) Irwin, they have a better idea of how coaches go about their business than most college freshmen.

"You can never really prepare too much for that," Bent said with a chuckle about Auriemma's rather blunt coaching style.."I know that everything he tells us is for our best interest so he wants to make us better players and a better team. What he says is right and what you are doing is wrong.

"He wants you to do well and it is up to me to make him trust me and have him trust me so much that he wants to put me in the game and is not just trying to get me minutes and stuff like that. When you
make a mistake and you can see the disappointment, you know you want to do better because you want to get in and want to make him proud and make your teammates trust you."

Those are lessons she learned at a young age from her father.

"It was just knowing that he had my best interest at heart," Bent said. "He was my dad off the court and my coach on the court. Being able to separate those two, I know anything they say on the court, it is not attacking your character, who you are; it is attacking how hard you are working, the decisions you are making and things like that."

Irwin said she couldn't remember the details leading to the first time Auriemma called her out in practice but said it likely had to be with something regarding her defense.

"It got real," Irwin said. "I had to turn something on inside, light a fire, get after it and prove to him that I can do it, I want to compete at this level. It lights a fire underneath you and I feel like that is his plan.

"I think (being coached by her mother) gave me a really solid background of knowledge, I know the game decently enough. I can see where he is coming from, I know he is not just yelling at me to yell at me. He is yelling at me to make me better and that is encouraging."

With fellow freshman Crystal Dangerfield unlikely to play tomorrow against Chattanooga, that could lead to more playing time for Bent and Irwin.

"I know when I get in I have to make the most of my minutes because it could change every game," Irwin said. "Just play as hard as I can, go after every ball, box out, do all the little things that will help my team win.

"You have to break old habits that aren't going to happen at this level, this high intensity level
and the coaches are here to remind you to do that. They are good at that, breaking those old bad
habits. It is best to listen to your coaches and do what they are asking you to do."

There are plenty of tickets available for tomorrow's game, the first of five games being played at the XL Center.

Playing alongside a talent like Breanna Stewart makes it easy to get overshadowed but there is absolutely no way that Morgan Tuck can be overlooked with the way she is playing.

Tuck finished last season not only with 10 straight double-digit scoring games but making more shots than she missed nine times during that stretch with seven games with more assists than turnovers.

It is a safe to say she has picked up right where she has left off. Had she scored one more point against Nebraska, Tuck would be the only Husky to score in double figures in every game this season.

In the last six games Tuck has 102 points while shooting 67 percent from the field (75 percent from inside the 3-point line) with 20 assists and 10 turnovers. When I pointed out the irony to Geno Auriemma that Tuck, who dealt with so many injuries earlier in her career, is the only member of her recruiting class to play in every game this season as both Breanna Stewart and Moriah Jefferson missed a game with a minor injury, he marveled at what she brings to the team.

"It is crazy," Auriemma said. "She is tough. Some of it is you have to be tough, you have to have some good luck, some good fortune which is always good but Tuck, she is the energizer bunny. She is always there at the end."

Tuck had 12 points in the first quarter, making all four of her field goals and going 4 for 4 from the foul line in last night's win over Tulsa. She had 16 points at halftime and with the game a complete mismatch, only played six minutes in the second half. She still finished with 18 points. As is her custom, she was quick to credit the guards for feeding her the ball when asked about her impressive first quarter.
"I knew that we needed to have a good start with the stretch of games that we are about to have. I just try to make sure when I get the ball inside that I finish every layup so I just try to make sure I do that every game," Tuck said.

PUTTING UP A FIGHT
Kia Nurse just shook her head when the topic recently turned to her brother's first NHL fight.

Darnell Nurse is a tough customer so it is not surprising that he would drop the gloves to stick up for an Edmonton Oilers teammate but to initiate his first NHL fight against the rugged Milan Lucic of the Los Angeles Kings who came into the regular season with 61 career NHL fights between the preseason, regular season and postseason was certainly a challenging way to engage in his first scrap with the Oilers.

"He doesn't back down from anybody so it was good to show off his tough side for a minute," Kia Nurse said. "He could of (picked an easier first fighting opponent) but Nurses don't pick anything easy, that is the way we are."

REUNION TIME
When Katie Lou Samuelson made it back to California during the Christmas break, she was struck by how much things have changed. Usually she was the one at home waiting for her sisters to return home from college.

"It was fun, we (Katie Lou and her sister Karlie) were both home for a couple of days and it was cool," Samuelson said. "It was funny because usually I am the one who is home and it was Bonnie (a 2015 Stanford graduate) this time who was stuck at home."
LOFTY PRAISE FOR IRWIN
There are few things that Auriemma values in players more than a passion for the game of basketball. When he was asked about incoming freshman Kyla Irwin recently becoming the all-time leading scorer in State College (Pa.) High School girls' basketball history, he couldn't help but rave about how hard Irwin competes.

"When kids get to be seniors they start playing their best basketball all the time so she has gotten a lot better," Auriemma said. "She's a kid who is going to be good no matter what. Is she going to be great? I don't know but she is going to be good no matter what because her enthusiasm for the game, her effort during the game, her energy level during the game there a very few kids like that. When you are like that, there is a very good chance that you are going to be a very good player."

I couldn't help but be struck by the irony that Connecticut Sun star Alyssa Thomas sponsors an AAU team featuring UConn commit Kyla Irwin especially since three of the 15 losses Thomas' Maryland team suffered in her final two collegiate seasons came at the hands of the Huskies.

The Alyssa Thomas Elite team, led by Irwin, won the 17-and-under title at the 14th annual United States Junior Nationals Hershey National Showcase. So after last night's Connecticut Sun game I was wrapping up an interview with Thomas and asked her how she came to sponsor an AAU team and especially one with a star eventually headed to UConn.

She said it is one of the benefits from her being sponsored by Under Armour.

"We get an allotment of gear and we are able to sponsor a team so I tried to sponsor a local team," Thomas said. "It is an organization my parents run and they are doing really well this year."

Thomas' father Bobby is the executive director of the Central PA Elite AAU program and her mom
Tina Klotzbeecher-Thomas is not only the organization's secretary but also the head coach of the team that Thomas sponsors and Irwin plays on.

"It is always good to give back," Thomas said. "I love to give back to the people who have supported me throughout my career. Now it is their opportunity, they are getting college exposure so hopefully they can get (opportunities) like I did."

What about Thomas, a former Maryland star, aiding in the development of a player who is part of UConn's next recruiting class?

"I know," Thomas said with a chuckle. "She is a good player. I have known her and her mom (Bethany, a former Branford resident and assistant coach on the AAU team) for a while so I am definitely happy for her."

As for Thomas, she was clearly hobbled after crashing into the basketball support after tangling up with Cappie Pondexter of the Chicago Sky in last night's game. Thomas left the game for a while, received some treatment and returned to the game drawing praise from Sun coach Anne Donovan.

"That kid who I am sure is going to be sore the next several days, she just battles," Donovan said. "(Sky rookie Betnijah) Laney is in there to play physical and try to keep her off the glass and she still comes away with six offensive boards. She kind of characterizes this team and how hard they play, they refuse to be outmatched."

Thomas downplayed the pain she might be in.

"The three days (off) is definitely going to help," Thomas said. "She put me in an awkward position and it didn't feel too good. I just tried to push through it. I have been playing with it (a sore hip) all season so I just get some rest."

There might not be a high school coach who has had more of a first-hand look at the next wave of UConn players than Mt. Lebanon (Pa.) High School coach Dori Oldaker.

UConn Class of 2016 commit Kyla Irwin was a key member of the State College (Pa.) HS team that eliminated Oldaker's Mt. Lebanon team out of the 2014 PIAA Class AAAA tournament. The teams met again in December in the Altoona Tip-Off Tournament. With Oldaker named the head coach of the U.S. team playing in the FIBA Americas U16 Championships and the trials for the teams currently taking place, the folks at USA Basketball set up a phone interview with Oldaker for me this afternoon.

"A great kid, very talented," Oldaker said. "She can get up and down the floor and I think she will be a swing (forward at UConn). The thing I love about her is that she loves the game. What is nice about her is she can go inside/outside. She is going to be a hard matchup; at the high school level she is a very hard matchup."

Oldaker also coached the U.S. 3x3 team which won the gold medal at the 2014 Youth Olympic Games. That team featured UConn incoming freshmen Napheesa Collier, De'Janae Boykin and Katie Lou Samuelson as well as Notre Dame signee Arike Ogunbowale. That quartet went 13-0 with nine of the wins by at least 10 points.

"It was fun watching them in what they are doing at the high school level and it will be fun watching them on TV next year," Oldaker said. "They really compete, they are great kids, they have a great deal of respect and are true leaders, true teammates."

UConn Class of 2017 commit Andra Espinoza-Hunter is one of 158 players currently in Colorado Springs for the U-16 trials but Oldaker politely refrained from discussing any of the players currently competing for the 12 spots on the U-16 squad.

There was one more UConn connection I asked her about. One of Mt. Lebanon's conference rivals is Chartiers Valley. It just so happens that the Chartiers Valley coach is former UConn guard Ashley Battle who played on three national championship teams during her days as a Husky.

"I actually coached Ashley Battle in the Dapper Dan (classic) way back," Oldaker said. "For her to be a high school player, college player and now a high school coach is pretty phenomenal. She is another great person, another great role model to have in our business.

"She understands where players are coming from, she is a player's coach. I think she has done a really nice job at Chartiers Valley."

The CBS Sports Network coverage of tomorrow's regular season home finale against Memphis not starting until tip off because the broadcast of the men's game between Lehigh and Colgate runs right up to the 2 o'clock hour. As a result, they will not be televising the pre-game ceremony when seniors Kiah Stokes and Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis will be honored and Mosqueda-Lewis' No. 23 gets inducted into the Huskies of Honor.

UConn announced that it will be offering a free live stream of the ceremony at this link http://www.uconnhuskies.com/collegesportslive/?media=489858 The event is set to start at 1:40 p.m.

\Also, thanks to my trusty iPhone, I will have videos up on my Tout account (available via my Twitter account @NHRJimFuller) as quickly as the internet inside Gampel Pavilion allows that to take place.

NO GOLDEN HORSHOE AWARD FOR KIA NURSE
Freshman guard Kia Nurse was nominated for Golden Horseshoe Award, presented annually since 1995 to the best athlete in the Burlington/Hamilton, Ontario area, for the second year in a row. However, Nurse's bid to become the first basketball player to win the honor since 2006 will have to wait.

Last year it was golfer Mackenzie Hughes who won the award while last night it was announced that the 2014 winner is Laura Fortino, who assisted on the game-winning overtime goal in the gold medal game of the Olympics as Canada defeated the United States to win a fourth straight title.

SEASON OVER FOR UCONN COMMIT
UConn Class of 2016 commit Kyla Irwin's quest for a state title during her junior season came screeching to a half when Altoona's Ali Treglia scored with 3.6 seconds remaining to lift Altoona to a 46-45 win over Irwin's State College team in the Pennsylvania District 6-AAAA title game.

Irwin had 17 points in the game as she scored in double figures in 22 of the 23 games as a junior as she averaged 20 points per game.

Altoona advances to play in the PIAA playoffs.