Early in the 2005 college basketball season, the Connecticut Huskies have shown the nation that they have re-tooled and are ready for a return trip to the Final Four.
Rudy Gay has led the No. 3 Huskies to a 7-0 record after defeating the Minutemen of Massachusetts 78-60 on Thursday night. Surprisingly, UConn has done this without a solid point guard and also after a very troublesome offseason. However, this has not stopped the Huskies from starting the season undefeated while winning the Maui Invitational tournament, where they had to defeat Arizona and Gonzaga, both of which who are ranked.
The season began with a lot of questions about the Huskies. Their main concern focused on the status of their two point guards. Marcus Williams, a junior from Los Angeles, and A.J. Price, a point guard who didn't play last year while recovering from a brain injury, both were suspended after their roles in the theft of some laptop computers from their fellow students at the university.
Williams will be allowed to practice with the team starting December 17 and will be allowed to play starting January 1st. Price, meanwhile, is gone for the year. This left freshmen Craig Austrie and Robert Garrison to play the point. While they have performed admirably, they still, quoting Coach Jim Calhoun, "play like freshmen." A player helping to overcome this defect is Rudy Gay.
Gay is a sophomore from Baltimore, Maryland who is averaging 16.4 points per game this season. He is also averaging 6.4 rebounds per game and almost 2 assists (1.7) per game. His 16.4 points leads the team while his rebounds per game make him second to Josh Boone. This is good news to Coach Calhoun, who is constantly pleading with his budding superstar to play more aggressively. The coach sometimes has to light a fire under Gay, as he did in the Huskies' last game. Gay had as many buckets (two) as fouls, as he only played seven of the game's first 20 minutes.
After the half, though Gay looked like the player Calhoun wants. During the Huskies' second-half surge, Gay led the charge with 9 points, including two spectacular dunks, and a three pointer. Though Gay is the go-to guy for the Huskies, they have all the pieces in place for a deep run in March.
The Huskies have experience as several members of this current team (Denham Brown, Rashad Anderson, Josh Boone, and Hilton Armstrong, Jr.) played on the Huskies' last national championship in 2004. They have depth as Rashad Anderson leads a bench that will only get stronger once Williams returns.
The Huskies, in addition to all this, have a Hall of Fame coach in Jim Calhoun. Calhoun, who was inducted in the Hall in 2005, won his first title in 1999, and then his second in 2004. He also has 240 victories at Connecticut.
The Huskies will also benefit from playing in a larger, stronger Big East. With the additions of Louisville, Cincinnati, Marquette, DePaul, and South Florida, the Big East will provide the Huskies with a lot of tournament-type games that will only help them come late March and early April.
That experience, along with Gay, the bench, and coach Calhoun, will help the Huskies contend for the 2006 NCAA championship.
Leave a Comment