In a tough loss, Connecticut shows tremendous heart

STORRS, Conn. – Kevin Ollie wanted to make sure those covering Wednesday night’s game do at least one thing above all else.

“I hope y’all write that we’ve got heart – at the end of your articles, this team has got heart,” said the UConn head coach.

He’s right.  This team has heart.  It was fully on display Wednesday night in a game they had no business even getting to overtime, let alone a second overtime where they led 78-71 with just over two minutes left.

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Connecticut will go as far as Napier, backcourt will take them

STORRS, Conn. – There’s no question Connecticut will ride their guards as much as possible this season. Given their personnel, that’s about their only choice as they are far deeper on the perimeter than up front and more talented there. It’s also where their most natural leaders are, in particular the one who didn’t score for much of Friday’s 57-49 win over Harvard largely because he was busy helping others do that.

The easy pick as the star on Friday night would be DeAndre Daniels. The sophomore forward, a talent who simply got buried behind more experienced players a year ago, had a long-awaited breakout game with 23 points on 9-12 shooting. He had a career high by halftime, as he scored 15 points in the opening frame, and if he can do that more, it would be a big development.

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Will more players follow Vonleh and re-classify back into their original class?

Last week began with some big news in the world of recruiting as Noah Vonleh opted to move back into the Class of 2013 after re-classifying into the class of 2014 a year earlier. Vonleh becomes the latest of several players to make that move, but it’s entirely possible he won’t be the last by a long shot – and it may be the case that this trend signals something else.

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Plenty of teams prepare to jockey for seeding, selection tonight

In the immortal words of the Black Eyed peas, tonight’s gonna be a good night.

There are 40 teams in action tonight, and more than half of them are likely to appear in the NCAA Tournament or seriously challenge for their conference’s automatic bid. We’ve got elite powers like Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio State in addition to upstarts that could make life miserable for those powerhouses, such as Vermont, Valparaiso and Cleveland State.

Here’s some of the top games to track tonight. … Continue Reading