UConn's run to Elite Eight shows power of talent, toughness and identity

By John Fanta
Published

Walking up to T-Mobile Arena on a sunny Thursday in Las Vegas, Jim Calhoun wore a smile on his face. The 80-year-old made the six-hour flight across the country to watch his Connecticut Huskies on Thursday night in the program’s first Sweet 16 since 2014.

"We’re pretty good, aren’t we?" he quipped before he entered the building. 

The Hall of Famer spoke no lies. In fact, that might be an understatement.

Connecticut put on a clinic in the regional semifinal, blowing out Arkansas 88-65 and running their margin of victory to 62 points across three big dance games. What’s the formula? Sophomore guard Jordan Hawkins (24 points) and junior big man Adama Sanogo (18 points, eight rebounds) are playing like All-Americans, and the ball is popping. The Huskies assisted on 22 of their 31 made field goals in Thursday’s rout.

"We said coming in, ‘we’ve got to jump them,’ Sanogo said following the win. "That was our mindset coming in because we saw how hard they played against Kansas. This game ended up being easy for us because we did jump them." 

Eight minutes in, the Razorbacks were within three at 20-17. What ensued was a 14-0 run by UConn in which five different players scored. It has been a trait of this 28-8 team’s success, as it moved to 15-0 against non-conference opponents in the process.

"I just liked how we started on offense," Hurley said. "We were in the gaps defensively and forcing them to take perimeter shots, and we were moving their defense around to get whatever we wanted."

The Razorbacks, just a 31% team from beyond the arc, had just seven assists on the night and went 5-for-16 from downtown. Eric Musselman’s program had another impressive tournament showing, with the signature victory over the defending national champion Jayhawks, but the Hogs were denied a third consecutive trip to the Elite Eight. 

"Their pieces really fit well together," Musselman said of the Huskies. "The two centers (Sanogo and Clingan), as I've mentioned, along with the perimeter shooting."

But there’s more than just a talent piece with Connecticut. Hurley and his staff have acquired plenty of top-level prospects, but year five has brought the NCAA Tournament breakthrough for this regime. Much like we’ve seen in big dances of the past, the best example being Virginia from 2018 to 2019, sometimes a low on college basketball’s big stage can help you to rise up the next time you go through it.

A season ago, the fifth-seeded Huskies got knocked off by Teddy Allen and 12-seed New Mexico State, experiencing the humiliation that comes with a first-round loss. 

"We were in Coach's office, and he really just told us things are going to change now," said Andre Jackson (seven points, eight rebounds, seven assists) following the win. "And he just told us we're all captains. And we hold part of that on our shoulders, too — we're going to take part of that blame when you feel that pain. We really, from that moment on, from that day on, we just really held each other to a higher standard and just told each other we're going to push for a national championship. We're going to push for that type of standard every day in practice, and we're going to hold each other to that."

This season hasn’t gone without adversity either. After losing six of eight games from Dec. 31 to Jan. 25, Connecticut’s players came together for a meeting.

"We were mad at each other," Sanogo said following Thursday’s win. "Guys were telling each other, ‘It’s your fault.’ Others were saying it was my fault. But this happens to us every time. There’s a time where a team can go sideways. After saying that, we met and said, ‘Yo bro, we were the best team in the country a couple weeks ago. Why are we getting mad at each other? Let’s stick to our identity and get back to what we were doing at the start of the season."

That meeting has proven to be successful, and five years to the day that Hurley was hired by UConn, the Huskies are 40 minutes away from the Final Four.

"We just think that we recruit great people that want to come to UConn for the right reasons," Hurley said when asked about the process of reaching this point. "We don't lie to them. We don't cheat to get them. We develop our young players and mix in transfers to supplement. So we're all about player development. We're all about our culture. And just the way that we do it, the way we go about things, I think, I'm proud of … I'm proud of how we've gotten here." 

"I’m just proud of the way we’ve built this thing."

All of the strong traits of the Hurley build were on display Thursday night, and Connecticut showed the remainder of the field that it belongs in the class of Alabama and Houston as a team that can cut down the nets in Houston.

John Fanta is a national college basketball broadcaster and writer for FOX Sports. He covers the sport in a variety of capacities, from calling games on FS1 to serving as lead host on the BIG EAST Digital Network to providing commentary on The Field of 68 Media Network. Follow him on Twitter @John_Fanta.

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