WBB : Syracuse dismantled in 53-point loss to UConn
Hartford, Conn. – There were few positive aspects to take out Syracuse’s game against No. 1 Connecticut Saturday, but Orange head coach Quentin Hillsman found a silver lining in his post-game press conference.
The Orange had just been humiliated by the Huskies, out-played on both ends of the court and nearly losing by more points than they scored. But Hillsman didn’t talk of how his team got drubbed.
Instead, he thought of this as a learning experience.
‘They are a very good team and he (Geno Auriemma) has got the formula down on what you have to do to win a national championship,’ Hillsman said in his introductory statement. ‘The beautiful part about it is that every year we get to see it. It was good for us to see so we know where we need to go.’
And if it is a learning experience, the Orange certainly has a lot to learn.
UConn showed Syracuse how long the Orange must go to be mentioned in the same echelon as the Huskies as No. 1 Connecticut defeated Syracuse, 107-53, Saturday afternoon in front of a crowd of 13,086 inside the XL Center.
UConn (17-0, 4-0) dominated every aspect of the game against Syracuse (13-5, 2-3), setting several individual and team records in the process. The Huskies sophomore Maya Moore became the fastest player to reach 1,000 points in UConn history, scored a career-high 40 points, and broke the single-game record of 3’s with 10. UConn also set a school record with 18 3’s.
From the opening tip, UConn controlled the action.
Coming into the contest, Hillsman talked about sophomore guards Erica Morrow and Tasha Harris not allowing Moore to get open, and making sure that UConn’s Renee Montgomery could not get going.
This opened up shooting lanes for freshman Caroline Doty, who hit four 3-pointers in the first seven minutes to give UConn a 22-9 lead. Once the Orange started to collapse on Doty. shooting lanes opened up for Moore, who drilled shot after shot from beyond the arc. All this led to 20-point lead for the Huskies at the half.
‘Maya is obviously a great player,’ Morrow said. ‘On our defensive rotations she got open looks and we are all college athletes and can hit an open shot. Not to take anything away from her, she’s a great player.’
Instead of buckling down in the second half, Syracuse regressed.
If there were open shots in the first half, there were nearly twice as many in the second. Doty left in the first half with a sprained knee, but Moore picked up the slack, connecting on 8-of-12 3-point shots and scoring 23 points. She proved on this day why she is the best player in the conference and why Hillsman’s talk of containing her might have been a little premature.
Syracuse, meanwhile, managed only 25 points in the second half as it watched UConn balloon its lead to as many as 58 points. The Orange did not score 10 points in the half until 6:52 remained in the period and UConn had already scored 93 points. Syracuse actually missed eight baskets between its 36th and 38th points, spanning a total of seven minutes.
Syracuse ended up shooting only 30.9 percent from the floor and just 20 percent from deep. UConn hit 52.1 percent of shots, while shot an absurd 18-of-39 from downtown.
Yet somehow, Hillsman complimented his team on its effort.
‘I thought my kids really competed and played hard,’ Hillsman said. ‘I don’t think we didn’t give enough effort to win the basketball game. They’re a very good basketball game. My initial thoughts are we did what we had to do. We went to the rim we played physical, we went to the basket and we didn’t back down.’
The plan of not backing down brought up questions about whether players came in with an effort to be extra physical. Both teams seemed on the verge to battle at times, with Juanita Ward picking up a technical at one point for physical play underneath. Auriemma even addressed a rumor after the game that Nicole Michael had tripped him (he refuted it.)
With this game in the books, Syracuse must now look ahead to the near future and tackling Pittsburgh next Saturday at the Dome. But it doesn’t seem too far in the past that Quentin Hillsman talked about Syracuse being the best team in the Big East.
With Saturday’s performance, it’s clear SU still has a long way to go. Just ask Auriemma. While the coach said the Orange have come a long way and are confident they can win, he wasn’t surprised to win the game by 54 points.
‘Was I surprised? No, I wasn’t surprised,’ Auriemma said. ‘They might be surprised but I wasn’t surprised. We’re really good and they gave us a lot of open shots, and when you give a good team a lot of open shots, you’re going to get beat by 50.’
