A.J. Price and Connecticut Stake Their Claim

The stage was set perfectly.  Mighty Connecticut with the brute Jeff Adrien would  battle against Marquette and wiry Jerel McNeal.  The mountain posing as Hasheem Thabeet would be coming to little ol’ Milwaukee to compete with the comparatively miniature Dominic James of less than 6 feet.

The story has already been written.  Wednesday was to serve solely as a refresher of the David vs. Goliath tale in front of 19.091 at the Bradley Center.

But then Goliath rewrote the script.

Marquette did their best to overcome the loss of Dominic James to injury and traded shots with UConn.  But AJ Price and UConn had too much ammo in their guns.

Price was filthy.  Thirty-six points, with eight threes, six rebounds and six assists.  Time and time again, he drained big three-point shots.  He stuck the dagger in Marquette with about a minute to go putting the Huskies up eight.

The most fascinating part of this game, and every Connecticut game really, is how hell bent on not passing to Hasheem Thabeet the Connecticut guards are.  It’s been discussed ad nauseam how inexperienced Thabeet is, so I’ll refrain from covering that again, but do they really have that little faith in him that they can’t just throw it to him maybe once every five or six possessions? 

In the first half he did not receive a post touch, his only field goal coming on a broken play.  I thought Dick Vitale was going to go take the ball from the Connecticut point guards and throw the lob to Thabeet himself. 

Stanley Robinson made his season debut.  What’s that?  This was his 19th game this year?  Hmm . . . I never realized he was playing.  He made his presence known in this game.  Robinson likes to dunk and he likes to yell.  When he can combine the two, he seems to enjoy them even more.  In fact, I’m not certain than he can dunk unless he yells.  Perhaps it releases the dunker within.

Jerel McNeal channeled his inner Dwyane Wade, found the George Thompson in his soul and made fans remember Brian Wardle in the second half as he poured in bucket after bucket.  It was a virtuosic performance in the second half scoring 21 of his 26 points.

Both teams looked very good overall in this game.  It was a controlled yet up-tempo game.  I think a lot of other teams who caught this game tonight know they’ll have their hands full with either of these teams in the tournament. 

For Connecticut to come into Milwaukee and win this one says something.  Historically they’ve been teases with their talent and few results, but I think they are a Final Four teams this year for sure. 

Marquette, not so much.  The loss of Dom James could prove to be a crucial blow to their hopes of advancing past round two of the NCAA tournament.