After a blowout win over DePaul on Wednesday night, the UConn men’s basketball team looks to close out their season on a high note, taking on a red-hot Villanova squad on the road Saturday night.
The Huskies (23-7, 12-7 Big East) have been on a tear as of late, winning seven of their last eight games, the lone loss coming at the hands of Creighton on the road. After a tough stretch spanning from New Year’s Eve to the end of January, UConn appears to be clicking at just the right time, finding their dominance from the beginning of the year. Don’t look now, but all but one of the last seven wins were decided by nine or more points.
“Since February, we’ve looked a lot like the team of November and December,” said Connecticut head coach Dan Hurley. “We’re one of the few teams in the country that’s proven we can win a tournament, a big tournament versus really good teams.”
Hurley, of course, is referring to the PK85, an in-season tournament in which the Huskies took down the likes of Oregon, Alabama and Iowa State in Portland.
While UConn has been thriving the last month and looking primed for tournament time, they have one last stop on their tour with the Wildcats. Early in the season when the two squads met at the XL Center, it was Connecticut who came out on top in a smooth, 8-point victory.
However, this is not the same Villanova team as it was in late December.
The Wildcats (16-14, 10-9) underwhelmed early in head coach Kyle Neptune’s first year at the helm, only to make a fantastic month of February themselves. Villanova has won six of their last seven games, including victories at home against Creighton and on the road against Xavier, handing the Musketeers just their second home loss of the season.
It was a tough start to the year for the Big East staple, amplified by a lack of senior Justin Moore and star freshman Cam Whitmore due to injury. With both of these high-impact guys back into the starting five, it’s been a whole different season.
Villanova isn’t anywhere near a lock to make the tournament – TeamRankings currently has them at a 5.4% chance of an at-large bid – but that doesn’t mean the team won’t put up a fight, especially for the automatic bid. The defending Big East Champions are finally feeling themselves and looking to do some damage, starting with sending a potential message Saturday night.
With college basketball’s regular season winding down to a close and the postseason ramping up next week, a mixed bag of emotions are running through the heads of players. Just ask UConn captains Andre Jackson and Adama Sanogo.
“It’s the best time of the year, really,” said Jackson with a smile. “It’s when it’s time to really pull together as a team and most teams are peaking now, getting to their best. Everyone on the team right now is really starting to find their role and knows what they bring to the table.”
Sanogo doesn’t feel the same level of “fun” as his counterpart.
“The last couple of years, our March was not good,” stated Sanogo. “This year, we gotta make sure we don’t make the same mistakes. This is the time for us to go to work again, just keep going. We’re getting to the point where if we lose the game, we’re out, so we can’t afford to make a mistake.”
Regardless of their viewpoint of March, the commonality across both leaders is clear: the Huskies are reaching their final form and ready to tackle one game at a time, starting with Saturday.
Tip-off is set for 7:30 p.m. at Finneran Pavilion in Villanova, Pennsylvania. The game will be broadcast live on FOX.