It's Not Toughness They're Lacking

Calhoun is stressing toughness in his team. That wasn’t the knock against them last year. The toughness was there. Wiggins taking a hard fall and bruising his hip, Dyson chipping his tooth on the court and playing through it and the bruising playing style of Jeff Adrien. The toughness is there it’s the cashing in that they lack. They went to the free throw line 253 more times than their opponents but only made 104 more free throws in those games.

They’ve got to improve at the charity stripe if they are going to utilize the size advantage that they possess. Its been the Huskies Achilles heel for the past decade. They’ve won championships with a team with poor free throw shooting but those teams had the likes of Ben Gordon and Emeka Okafor on them. Not that Jerome and Thabeet can’t match the talent of those two but they’re not there yet.

The poor free throw shooting goes right down the board starting with Adrien (59%), then Price (69%), Johnson (50%), Dyson (72%), Robinson (66%) and Thabeet (51%). The guards need to get their numbers into the mid-eighties, the forwards into the high seventies and the big men into the low seventies. No 60’s and definitely no 50’s.

So if Calhoun wants to have the toughest sons of a bitches out there, he better have them work on making it pay off.

Going Big?

During practice Calhoun put Dyson on the point and played around with a bigger line up. It’s an interesting look and Jerome did have 65 assists last year. Though the big team would help out in rebounding, the big size would slow the game down and Calhoun was stressing the run game which was lacking last year. There will be times when Uconn will be tested by size, Georgetown, Indiana and Providence come to mind, but a change in philosophy for the team doesn’t seem likely.

Price limped out of practice with a hurt ankle. He has shown improvement, shooting the ball better and getting everyone involved. This team is going to need Price in a big way. If he finds his outside range, it should open up the entry passes to the big men down low. To many times last year teams played off the outside shots and clogged the passing lanes. Hopefully the injury isn’t serious.