re: 2022-23 Basketball MegaThread

Everyone seems to be slurping on UCONN. They're good but it's getting a little annoying listening to national media talk about our game.

A lot of backhanded compliments like "no disrespect to Arkansas, but.."

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Everyone seems to be slurping on UCONN. They're good but it's getting a little annoying listening to national media talk about our game.

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5 of their top 7 players shoot 35%+ from 3, Sanogo is a fricking beast who also shoots free throws as well or maybe better than anyone on our team, and they have a 7’2” big man coming off the bench. They are beatable as their season has shown, but on paper they’re a nasty looking bunch.

Bc they were ranked #1 for part of the season. It's like playing #1 seed again. They struggled in January and then figured things out. This will be a tough game.

Thankfully, they have a day less of rest and Muss has basically had a week to prep. He's like a mad scientist when he has plenty of time to prep.

Edit: Muss is 30-4 at Arkansas when given 4 or more days to prepare. That's pretty damn good.

Here's what I think the game comes down to

Their offensive rebounding vs our ability to generate turnovers

Our ability to make free throws and draw fouls vs their 3pt shooting.

Their fans are daring Council to try and dunk on Clingen. Hopefully word gets back to Council. Love to see him posterize their big man.


ETA-Not that I think he should go at him repeatedly, but I just hope an opportunity presents itself.

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ETA-Not that I think he should go at him repeatedly, but I just hope an opportunity presents itself.

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I expect muss's game plan will be exactly that. Go right at them and try to finish around the rim. If not draw the foul. Getting their big men in foul trouble is the way to beat them.

Our bread and butter is driving the basket and finishing or getting fouled with any number of players. It will be a repeat of the second half vs Kansas all game. Nick will get his shot to get in rhythm and if he does we roll, if he doesn't we see the lineup we saw vs Kansas and the same offense. And it will work.

This game will be like the Auburn, Kentucky, and Gonzaga games last year. The opposing team’s big will get his but we need to smother the 3 point line and try to prevent as many offensive putbacks as possible. UConn is getting an offensive rebound on an unreal 42% of their misses this year. The good news is that Sanogo really isn’t all the physical - he’s more of a finesse player. But still very good, obviously. The last key defensively is to win the turnover battle. Probably need to win it by a lot. UConn is prone to turning it over at an above average clip.

Offensively, they will let us drive to the basket so we need to do that. We need our guards going downhill over and over and over and over again. Getting Sanogo and Clingon into foul trouble would be a big help. We’ll likely get to the foul line at a good rate. Obviously we are going to have to shoot from there like we have the last 2 games instead of what we saw most of the season.

If all of those things go right, we can win. Hell, we did it 3 times last year.

I suspect we will send all 5 at the boards on defense instead of trying to leak one or two for a transition basket .

Devo said in an interview tonight the first 12 min of the Kansas game the team didn’t follow the game plan and they went for too many 3’s and long shots. I think that’s what he meant when he said it finally clicked in his post game. Hopefully they now know Muss plan works if they will follow it.

Sounds like they are going to approach Sonago and Clingan like they did Tishebwe in the first Kentucky game.

For anybody who didn’t see the locker room interviews from today