UConn’s Bid For 3 Consecutive NCAA Men’s Championships Seems Unlikely

Dan Hurley couldn’t hide his disgust. The Connecticut men’s basketball coach, who led the Huskies to the past two NCAA tournament titles, was almost apoplectic about his team’s first half effort in Friday night’s 71-62 loss to Creighton in the Big East tournament semifinals at Madison Square Garden. It certainly wasn’t what Hurley expected when he turned down the Los Angeles Lakers job last summer and dreamed of the Huskies becoming just the second program to win three consecutive national championships.

During the opening 20 minutes, Creighton made 75% of its field goals and led 46-35 at intermission even though star 7-foot-1 center Ryan Kalkbrenner had only four points. UConn improved in the second half, limiting the Blue Jays to 30.8% shooting and cutting its deficit to just four points with five minutes remaining. Still, Creighton played better down the stretch and snapped UConn’s five-game winning streak.

The No. 8 seed Huskies (23-10) will look to get back on track on Friday night when they face No. 9 seed Oklahoma (20-13) in an NCAA tournament West Regional first round game in Raleigh, N.C. If UConn wins, it will likely play Florida (30-4), the No. 1 seed and Southeastern Conference tournament champions.

Before UConn won the past two national titles, Florida was the last team to win back-to-back championships, achieving the feat in 2006 and 2007. The 2008 Gators team missed the NCAAs. While this year’s UConn squad was in no danger of not qualifying for the NCAAs, the Huskies have been inconsistent and have not lived up to their preseason No. 3 ranking in the Associated Press poll. That’s why Hurley seemed bemused when asked after Friday’s loss if the Huskies could be a pick to upset a high seeded team in the NCAAs.

“When (UConn’s name) flashes on the screen, maybe the bracketologist may start saying, ‘Oh,’” Hurley said. “But I think when you watch a defensive effort like the first half and you compare it to what we’ve been the last couple of years, where we’re a very intimidating team defensively (and) on the backboard, I mean eventually they’re going to pull up Synergy (a popular coaching and scouting tool where teams can watch and analyze games). I mean, eventually you pull up the film and you see the people. We just have multiple players that people attack in one-on-one situations. And we really, really struggle in guarding people one-on-one.”

In the two previous NCAA tournaments, UConn won each of its 12 games by double digits, dominating like few champions have ever done. The 2023 Huskies ranked No. 3 in analyst Ken Pomeroy’s adjusted offensive efficiency metric and No. 7 in KenPom’s adjusted defensive efficiency metric. And even after losing starters Andre Jackson, Adama Sanogo and Jordan Hawkins, the Huskies were even better last season. They went 37-3, won the Big East regular season and tournament titles, went 27-1 in their last 28 games and ranked first and fourth, respectively, in KenPom’s offensive and defensive metrics.

UConn had four starters selected in last year’s NBA draft: guard Stephon Castle and center Donovan Clingan were lottery picks, while guards Tristen Newton and Cam Spencer went in the second round. Still, with the way Hurley and his staff recruited and developed players, the Huskies were thought to be able to re-build again and remain near the top of the AP poll.

The first hint that this season’s UConn team was different than the previous two seasons occurred in late November during the Maui Invitational in Hawaii. The Huskies opened by losing by two points to Memphis in overtime, followed up a day later with a one-point loss to Colorado and finished the trip the next day with an 18-point loss against Dayton. Hurley complained several times about the officials, as is his custom, but he ultimately took responsibility for what went wrong.

“When you come to a tournament like this and it’s three games in three days and it starts to go bad, there’s no way of fixing it because there’s no time to,” Hurley said. “You just have to deal with the situation. It was a humbling trip obviously for a program that’s accomplished what we’ve accomplished.”

After those losses, UConn fell from No. 2 in the AP poll to No. 25. The Huskies then won eight consecutive games to climb back to No. 9, but they went 6-6 over the next 12 games, although star freshman Liam McNeeley sat out three of those losses with an injury. UConn closed out the Big East regular season with five wins in a row to move up to third in the league standings. In the conference tournament quarterfinals, UConn fell behind Villanova, 36-31, at halftime before pulling away late for a 73-56 victory. The next night against Creighton, UConn couldn’t complete the comeback and lost in the semifinals just like they did two years ago to Marquette.

Back then, the Huskies ended up winning the national title. When asked on Friday night if UConn could go on a similar run, Hurley said “we have obviously not performed like that team,” which had won nine of 10 entering the Big East tournament and lost to a talented Marquette squad that featured three players who are currently in the NBA in Tyler Kolek (New York Knicks), Oso Ighodaro (Phoenix Suns) and Olivier-Maxence Prosper (Dallas Mavericks).

Still, Hurley held out hope that UConn’s fortunes could change this week, noting that the Huskies are not a physical team, which is a negative in a league like the Big East where officials don’t call as many fouls as opposed to the NCAA tournament where officials call more fouls and don’t allow as much physicality. At least, that’s Hurley’s theory.

On Friday night, UConn begins its quest for three consecutive national titles, joining UCLA, which won seven consecutive NCAA tournaments from 1967 through 1973, as the only teams with more than two championships in a row. The Huskies face Oklahoma, which went 6-12 in a loaded Southeastern Conference that has a record 14 teams in the field. Neither team is a defensive juggernaut, with UConn 94th in KenPom’s adjusted defensive efficiency metric and Oklahoma 70th. The Huskies have the 14th-best offense, per KenPom, while Oklahoma is 21st.

The winner will then almost certainly advance to play Florida, which opens against No. 16 seed Norfolk State. The Gators have six consecutive victories and won 12 of their past 13 games, a stretch that includes two victories over Alabama (the No. 2 seed in the East Regional) and one win apiece over Auburn (the No. 1 seed in the South Regional) and Tennessee (the No. 2 seed in the Midwest Regional). The Gators are among the favorites to win the national title, just like UConn last season. The Huskies, though, are in a much different spot now.

After the loss to Creighton, UConn stayed in its New York City hotel and watched the film of that game on Saturday morning. Hurley told reporters that “it was a long session” and that “you shouldn’t have sessions that long this time of year.” Hurley went over the team’s defensive struggles as well as its inability to share the ball on offense, as the Huskies had just seven assists. The Huskies arrived back to campus Saturday afternoon and spent about 24 hours apart before returning to the gym on Sunday afternoon for some shooting.

Hurley recalled that in 2022 he spent too much time fretting over UConn’s three-point loss to Villanova in the Big East semifinals. Six days later, the Huskies lost to New Mexico State in the first round of the NCAA tournament. This time, Hurley has vowed not to let the disappointing performance against Creighton linger. It’s time to get started on the quest for the three-peat.

“We’re beyond it,” Hurley told reporters Sunday night. “We’re ready to go.”