STORRS –- The UConn men’s basketball program celebrated head coach Dan Hurley’s 51st birthday on Tuesday with chocolate cake and vanilla frosting, served in an ice cream cone and topped off with blue and white sprinkles. This year’s celebration was a lot better than his 50th, which came a day after the brutal loss to St. John’s in Hartford, before he got Covid and had to watch from home as the team dropped another game at Seton Hall.
Thinking back, he said, the week of his 50th was one of the two lowest points in his time coaching at UConn, the other was when the 2021-22 team lost to New Mexico State in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
This year his birthday came a day after earning the program’s first AP No. 1 ranking in 15 years.
“If you’re a (basketball) coach or a player and it’s a winter birthday, you’ll never have a great birthday. You’ll have some good birthdays and then you’ll have some of the worst ones you can imagine. Even if you win, because then you’ve got the next game on top of you, which is Creighton, so that’s on the top of your mind,” Hurley said.
“So I’ve been really sharing this birthday with Baylor Scheierman, Ryan Kalkbrenner, Trey Alexander and Coach Mac (Greg McDermott). Because I’ve watched so much of them the last two days, I feel like I’m sharing my birthday with the Bluejays.”
With the way things have looked for the Huskies lately, rebounding and defending inside without their game-changing center Donovan Clingan, the matchup against 7-foot-1 Kalkbrenner has been even more of a focus.
Clingan’s availability to return Wednesday for the first time since the Dec. 20 injury to his foot, Hurley said, is a “coin flip.”
“This is the best he’s been in terms of just the physical, probably since we even started practice, just the lightest he’s been. (Wednesday is) a big day because he’s practiced back-to-back days and gotten live reps back-to-back days here,” Hurley said. “So we’ll huddle up with the medical team and just see how he’s feeling after doing back-to-back days. If not (Wednesday) I would think worst-case scenario, unless there’s a major setback, he’s in for the weekend.”
UConn will play Villanova on the road Saturday with about a week between its next game at home against Xavier Jan. 28.
If Clingan doesn’t play, or even if he does in limited minutes, Samson Johnson will have his work cut out for him with the Kalkbrenner matchup in the frontcourt.
“We’re vulnerable everywhere the way it’s looked on film for us in terms of being able to stop him the way we’re currently constituted,” Hurley said. “We’re scrambling and looking at some different ways to try to guard centers and some different things to do when the ball goes up on the backboard. Not all of it’s been Samson, and it’s been extremely physical when shots go up on the rim.”
Kalkbrenner, the 2022-23 Big East Defensive Player of the Year, is averaging 15.9 points, 7.4 rebounds and 2.5 blocks per game on the year.
“We obviously need to rebound. They have three great players so we have to contain them as best we can and try to get out in transition and run,” point guard Tristen Newton said. “But first thing first is defensive rebounding.”
Scheierman, a senior and the Bluejays’ 6-7 four-man, leads the team in points (18) and rebounds (8.3) per game. Alexander, a junior, is averaging 16.3 points, 6.1 rebounds and 4.5 assists per game. Creighton, ranked 18th in the country, is in a three-way tie for second place in the Big East, losing just two close conference games back-to-back against Villanova and Marquette.
“They’re a Final Four contender, they have as much (of a chance), I hope, to win the big things as anybody. When you bring three guys back like that, that might have all been drafted last year… I mean to bring three guys back that have a ton of experience,” Hurley said. “They’ve got three of the best players in the country at their position: center, combo guard and on the wing. Scheierman, in particular, is one of the best players in the country, and they’re three rotation NBA players maybe right now.
“Not many teams brought that back. We had that, and they all left to the NBA. So it’s a tough matchup.”
Extra juice from the crowd
Wednesday’s game will be a whiteout in Storrs and, after the success it had last year, UConn is bringing back the $2 beer night promotion.
“You win at home not because you have a great history, or even because you sell a lot of tickets. You win at home because it’s an intimidating place to play, it’s nonstop loud, it’s hard to communicate, the fans are in it from the start whether you’re playing well or playing poorly. The crowd is organized, it’s chaotic and it’s loud from the anthem all the way through,” Hurley said. “We need that (Wednesday).”
What to know
Site: Gampel Pavilion, Storrs
Time: 7 p.m.
Records: No. 1 UConn: 15-2 (5-1 Big East), No. 18 Creighton: 13-4 (4-2 Big East)
Series history: Creighton leads, 6-1, with all games decided by single digits
Last meeting: Feb. 11, 2023 – Creighton 56, UConn 53 at CHI Health Center in Omaha
TV: FS1 – Tim Brando, Bill Raftery
Radio: UConn Sports Network on FOX Sports Radio 97.9 – Mike Crispino, Wayne Norman
Pregame reading:
- Movin’ on up: UConn men take over top spot in AP Top 25 for first time since 2009
- Alex Karaban, Cam Spencer combine for 46 points, lift UConn men to 80-67 win over Georgetown
- ‘Cling Kong watch:’ UConn men’s basketball star Donovan Clingan nearing return from foot injury
- Dom Amore: Incoming Ahmad Nowell has the look, sound of a Dan Hurley Husky
- Jordan Hawkins sets new career-high with 34 points in shorthanded Pelicans’ win over Mavericks
- UConn commit Isaiah Abraham shows mature, multipositional skill set at Hoophall Classic