Year of the Husky

Well WoWo did a great job in our first guest blog, but it's time to pass the torch. When I joined the Brandeis radio station, I was first on a show with "Broadway" Ben Wolinsky and "Jersey" Jay Hyne. So you're in good sports hands here.

Let me tell you a little more about Jason Hyne. Jay is studying to become a Doctor--a Juris Doctor. After graduating from Brandeis (where we met on our freshman hall), Jay went on to UConn Law School where he's currently finishing up his studies. Jay and I celebrated in pure, uninhibited joy when Aaron "F*ing" Boone hit a majestic shot into a Bronx night and celebrated when David Tyree found a football on the side of his helmet. We don't agree on hockey (he roots for the Demonic team from the Dirty Jerz, where he's originally from) or what constitutes a "sport", but that makes for so many fun debates. One place I'll certainly agree he has a little more knowledge than I have is college basketball. Here's his post:
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It's official: UConn basketball is back. The men and women are ranked #1 together for the first time since December 2003, just a few months before both teams would win the national championship. The men are 21-1 with an undefeated road record and 8 wins against ranked teams. The women are equally hot at 21-0 and haven't lost a first place vote in the rankings since the second week of the season.

Good things come in threes, and the UConn men are vying for their third national title. The timing fits, too. They won it all in 1999 and 2004, and a championship this year would continue their pattern of winning a title every five years. The women are a different story, cutting down the nets in 1995, 2000, 2002, 2003, and 2004. Typing that sentence still gives me goosebumps. Jim Calhoun and Geno Auriemma have already cemented their places among the best college hoops coaches of all time, and if Geno takes his girls all the way this season (wow, does that sound bad) he might overtake Pat Summitt as the best coach in women's basketball history. Tennessee fans would argue with that, as Summitt has won 8 titles versus Geno's soon-to-be total of 6, but Auriemma's championships have come over a much shorter period of time. 6 championships in 14 years is more impressive than 8 titles over 22 years. Especially when you consider that Geno will have won all but one of his championships within the last 9 years. Plus, Geno has two undefeated seasons (this year could make it three) compared to Summitt's one.

But as any college basketball fan will tell you, it is much harder for a men's program to stay dominant than a women's program. That is why Calhoun's performance this season has been even more impressive than his UConn "counterpart" (read: rival). Consider their 2006 Elite Eight loss to the University That Shall Not Be Named. UConn dominated the regular season with a roster set a record for producing FOUR first round draft picks (Rudy Gay, Hilton Armstrong, Marcus Williams, and Josh Boone) as well as one second round pick (Denham Brown). That team was loaded and was immediately decimated by the draft.

Huskies fans wondered how Calhoun, a man known more for his love of the F word than for his patience, would react to a rebuilding phase. But Calhoun proceeded to calmly reconstruct a champion. He waited for A.J. Price to recover from a brush with death (brain hemorrhage) and a brush with the law (stealing laptops). He allowed players with tremendous upside potential to develop (Jerome Dyson, Jeff Adrien). He searched for recruits near and far (Kemba Walker from the Bronx, Stanley Robinson from Birmingham, Alabama). He even found Hasheem Thabeet in Tanzania.

The team Calhoun built has been slow to develop, slower than any other UConn squad since 1990, when Tate George hit The Shot. The Huskies actually missed the 2006-07 NCAA tournament for the first time in 20 years. They earned a 4 seed in 2007-08, only to lose to San Diego in the first round. Aside from stuttering through a few Erin Andrews interviews, Calhoun seemed to take it all in stride. He let Curtis Kelly and local favorite Dougie Wiggins walk. He shrugged off Thabeet's insane comments on the cover of ESPN the Magazine. And he stopped screaming about his biggest UConn bugaboo - atrocious free throw shooting - at postgame press conferences.

So, where do we stand? The team has finally realized its potential. Throughout the last two seasons, UConn played like a bunch of scared freshmen and sophomores (which they were) and would fold if they trailed by more than eights points. Now, they have a swagger that is supposed to come with a roster full of talented juniors and seniors. They are leading the league in blocks for the eighth straight year and have absolutely dominated on the road. From their comeback win at Gonzaga in December to their win at Louisville only hours after being named the top team in the country, this team is simply intimidating. Thabeet's presence inside cannot be measured by numbers, although he is easily the leading shotblocker in the country. I have seen countless big men literally run away from the basket because of Thabeet's wingspan, which is about two inches shorter than the alien that killed Dr. Okun in Independence Day. The guard play has been tremendous as well, with Price and Dyson averaging over 10 ppg and Walker not far away with 9. And then there is Jeff Adrien, who can sleepwalk through a double-double against just about anyone.

While the #1 spot has been a revolving door this season, most of those teams have faltered in big games. UNC lost to BC, Pitt lost to Louisville, Duke lost to Wake Forest (and got crushed by Clemson shortly thereafter), and Wake Forest has lost to everybody. UConn, on the other hand, just keeps getting stronger. The fans can sense it, too. I attended the UConn-Providence game in Storrs, and the place was absolutely packed. There were countless chants of Num-Ber One and the players lived up to the billing. The people of Connecticut know that something special is happening. When the women travel to North Carolina to play the #2 Tar Heels on national TV, and crush them by 30 points, you know what's coming. When both students and regular fans are lined up outside Gampel for two hours in 5-degree windchill just to get in, you know a championship is on its way. When you know that the only way you can lose is if Thabeet picks up three fouls in the first three minutes, you know you are The Contender. While I think the Huskies could afford to lose a game or two to keep their egos intact, a #1 seed seems likely, and if that happens, watch out. It is an exciting time to be in Connecticut right now.
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Thanks to Jay for that article. I, too, am a big Husky fan. Being from New York, there's not really a college team I identify with, so I sort of attached myself to Connecticut when they had Ray Allen and Israeli legend Doron Sheffer in the backcourt. I'm glad to see they're back in national prominence and I'm looking forward to watching how they do in the tournament.

We'll have some more of these guest blogs coming up...thanks to Jay and Ben for their great work so far!