The UConn men’s basketball team (4-0), No. 2 in the country as of Monday’s Associated Press poll, cruised to an 81-46 win over East Texas A&M, formerly known as Texas A&M-Commerce.
Samson Johnson won the tip for the Huskies, but two bad passes by Solo Ball resulted in East Texas A&M scoring the first basket. Ball redeemed himself by making a 3-pointer to give the Huskies the lead for good.
Turnovers were a problem for Connecticut. They exceeded their total from the Le Moyne game in one half, recording 11 at the midway point. Five of those came before the first media timeout. UConn finished the game with a season-high 19 turnovers. While that may be a lot, they turned the ball over less in the second half.
“Obviously, just silly mistakes,” Hassan Diarra said. “It all starts with me; I had five turnovers.”
A trend for the Huskies is their elite defense. That showed in the first half, with seven steals and seven blocks, with the latter stat coming from six different players. Diarra and Alex Karaban each had two steals, while Johnson led at the break with two rejections. Karaban continued to be a defensive beast at Gampel Pavilion, with eight blocks in 1.5 games.
Jayden Ross, coined as a “rocket” by coach Dan Hurley and his teammates, looked the part in the first half. He came soaring for a block at the 10:16 mark of the first half. He also soared for a second time for a ferocious poster dunk with 55 seconds remaining in the first half, getting the and-1 foul call.
One of the best sequences of the first half for Connecticut was when Diarra’s steal set up Liam McNeeley for his first career dunk.
At the half, UConn was up 42-20, heading into the locker room on a 16-3 run, which began with the McNeeley dunk and ended with two free throws made by Ahmad Nowell. That run extended to 26-5 until the Lions’ 3-pointer at the 17:06 mark in the second half.
The quiet offensive night extended into the second half, with Ball leading the team with 12 points. The Huskies shot 55% from the field but had their lowest scoring outing of the season. It was the first game that there was not a standout performer, and Hurley noted postgame that these offensive lulls are something that needs to be cleaned up.
“No one played well today,” the two-time national champion coach said. “It was across the board, overall, a poor performance. I mean, you shoot 54%, the other team shoots 25%, you should probably win by 55 or 60 points.”
Tarris Reed Jr. nearly had his third double-double as a Husky, scoring nine points and grabbing 10 rebounds. All of Reed’s 10 boards came in the first half. He was wincing at his hand heading to the bench but did not receive medical attention from the athletic trainers.
The Huskies needed a convincing win before the Maui Invitational with a field including No. 4 Auburn, No. 5 Iowa State and No. 10 North Carolina. However, they looked arguably their worst offensively.
“Maui [Invitational] is no joke,” Karaban said. “You see the teams in there, playing the best of the best, and we have four games under our belt where we watch film and really learn from it and just be honest with ourselves.”
While UConn outrebounded the Lions 44-35, the team looked like a shell of themselves in the second half on the glass, getting outrebounded 21-17. The UConn coaching staff noted postgame that this is something they want to clean up, especially with the big men they will face later this season.
Hurley emphasized that UConn is one of the best passing and ball security teams in the country. He was disappointed with that effort, as the Huskies had a negative assist-to-turnover ratio.
Karaban scored 11 points, a season-low for him. He took a season-low five shots from the field. Despite that, he looked comfortable playing off the ball, dishing out three assists and having a team-high +36 plus/minus.
“We can’t have too many games where [Karaban] takes five shots in 30 minutes,” Hurley said. “So, he’s got to be more assertive out there.”
Surprisingly, the Huskies were outshot at the free throw line, making 10 to East Texas A&M’s 13.
“[It’s] inconceivable,” Hurley said. “I remember coming in [to UConn] at Wagner and I don’t think we had out-shot UConn at the free throw line.”
Connecticut’s competition turns up a notch next week, with Memphis as their first-round opponent at the Lahaina Civic Center on Monday afternoon.