MILWAUKEE – Luck hasn’t fallen the way of the UConn men’s basketball team very much this season.
But when Alex Karaban drove at Kam Jones, the shot clock winding down with just over seven minutes to go in the second half Saturday night, and flicked up a free throw line floater, lucky was the only way he could describe it.
“I just tried getting the foul, I tried swooping my arms to get the foul and I guess Jones did a good job of not really making contact. Just shot it,” the Huskies’ captain said. “I mean, we deserve some luck, too, as a team. We’ve been unlucky with, whether that’s with my free throws against ‘Nova or just other moments with other teams, so that was our lucky moment. We deserve more lucky moments.”
UConn has been on the wrong end of other-worldly shooting performances, bad bounces and missed calls on multiple occasions this season. But Saturday night was the Huskies’ turn for good fortune, and it happened to come in a road victory over ninth-ranked Marquette before a crowd of 18,129 at Fiserv Forum. The Huskies turned the ball over a season-high 25 times and allowed 17 offensive rebounds, but Solo Ball – now sixth in the nation in 3-point percentage (45.58%) – could not miss as he led the team to a ridiculous 63.2% shooting clip (12-for-19) from 3 with his seven makes on nine attempts.
Solo Ball’s 25-point double-double leads No. 25 UConn men to 77-69 road victory over No. 9 Marquette
The 77-69 final score marked a significant win for UConn’s NCAA Tournament resume, but a massive victory for morale with Liam McNeeley waiting in the wings, just about ready to make his long-awaited return.
A game-time decision coming into Saturday, McNeeley went through warm ups with a sizeable brace on his right ankle, but was officially ruled out about a half hour before tip-off.
“When you’re four and a half weeks without having played live basketball, as much as he wanted to play, we could not put him in a game versus that team off of just one practice where you do everything,” coach Dan Hurley said. “He had not been doing live work, he had just been doing on-air work and shooting and skill work in dummy offense, 5-on-0. So now he’s got a chance to have a full week of practice and add a lot to the offense, the defense, the rebounding and the confidence.”
Hurley’s goal for the stretch without McNeeley was to win enough games so the team wouldn’t “get demoralized.” Before Wednesday’s game against DePaul in Hartford, Hurley said, “I think we’re teetering” on that edge of demoralization.
UConn is 5-3 in the eight games without its five-star frosh, and Saturday’s victory brought enough positive energy to count as two.
“It’s a big confidence builder for us,” Hurley said. “We’re a program that was, when Liam went out we were a legitimate top-12, top-15 level team. His absence hurt our level a lot. All of our numbers took significant dips and obviously we lost games. So now, with the development of Solo and Jaylin Stewart, and I think that sophomore class in general, Jayden Ross’ defense today – this could be a blessing.”
Did the Huskies find an answer on defense?
UConn flew around defensively on Saturday night, switching everything against Marquette’s experienced group of multi-level scorers. The Golden Eagles, coming in as KenPom‘s 25th most efficient offense, shot just 32% from the field in the first half. They also missed half of their free throws as UConn built its lead to as many as 22 points before the break.
“You can’t play conventional defense against Kam Jones and David Joplin, Chase Ross, with (stretch bigs) Ben Gold and Royce Parham, with their ability to pick-and-pop. And Stevie Mitchell, I’ve seen people put centers on Stevie Mitchell and now he’s destroying that,” Hurley said. “So the best thing (switching everything) is something we don’t do. We practiced it for a couple days, at times it was ugly, but I think it was definitely the best course of action for this game based on our personnel.”
The champs were there
Andre Jackson Jr. and Cam Spencer, beloved pieces of the 2023 and 2024 national championship teams, respectively, sat behind UConn’s bench on Saturday night to get an up-close look at this year’s squad.
“That gave me a little bit of an adrenaline boost, for sure. It was a little bit of pressure, too, because we couldn’t lose with them here,” said Karaban, the only remaining starter from both title teams. “If we lost with them here, it would be heartbreaking because those two guys, they were keys to us on the two respective championships, so no chance we were losing with them here.”
Both former Huskies spoke to the team after the game.
“They just said their thoughts on the game and just how we can continue to get better as a team,” Karaban said. “They shared their moments, and everyone better be listening to those two guys.”
