Speed Kills

With Mandeldove recovering from surgery to remove bone spurs, Uconn will have two role players nursing injuries. Gavin will have his boot removed in a few more weeks. These injuries show that these kids are working extremely hard and Calhoun is making an emphasis on conditioning this time around because he noticed his team ran out of gas toward the end of the season. This could also be evident in the lack of energy in the second half of games. At this time last year the team focused on bulking up its players for the rigors of Big East competition but now Calhoun is looking for a more fast break oriented offense and is pushing his team to run more.

This stable of guards can do just that and Calhoun has plenty of them to rotate. Dyson, Price, Wiggins, Austrie and Beverly create a high octane push-the-ball-up offense and with Johnson and Robinson as big time finishers, I don’t see why this team doesn’t make use of their speed.

The one player that could lose playing time is Austrie, simply because he doesn’t have the speed of the other guards. This could be a double edged sword because it seemed that the offense flowed smoothly with Austrie at the point. Though he is one of the more consistent outside threats on the team, he could end up being fifth in line.

To get this team to resemble the Uconn teams of old, they need to focus on passing the ball up the court and not rely on dribbling. Last years team never felt comfortable with passing up the court for easy buckets and when they did they ended up becoming turnovers.

As they say, speed kills and Uconn had made its living taking the blocked shot or defensive rebound and turning it up the court and creating shots before the defense could settle. This years success falls on the shoulders of the guards and their comfort level with playing the up-tempo game.