Auriemma blasts team for performance against Irish
By TIM CASEY
Assistant Sports Editor
A normally animated Geno Auriemma sat on a metal chair, hands placed on his knees and fingers interlocked, for a few minutes in the middle of the second half. He stared straight ahead and refused to call timeout, despite his team's obvious difficulties.
"To be honest with you, before the game, during the timeouts in the first half, and at halftime and in the timeouts in the second half, it [talking with his players] didn't change anything we were doing on the court," Auriemma said. "So rather than giving them something else that wasn't going to affect the game, I figured they had a better idea so let's see if it works."
It didn't.
From Niele Ivey's steal and subsequent layup for the first basket of the game to Imani Dunbar's three-pointer at the end, the heralded Huskies seemed more confused than confident.
How aggravated was Connecticut's head coach?
He sarcastically questioned his team's toughness.
"We have more guys that spend more time in the training room [during practice] than on the court working on their game," Auriemma said.
Auriemma then criticized his best player.
Shea Ralph, the 1999 Big East Player of the Year and first-team All-American played only 20 minutes, including just six in the second half. She committed zero fouls on the afternoon and suffered no injuries but after an ineffective performance (2 points and 2 assists), Auriemma decided to bench his team's star with 14:05 remaining. Ralph never returned.
"Nothing was working for her this afternoon," Auriemma said. "There was no point in just running around out there for no reason."
Connecticut entered the contest on a 30-game winning streak. Before Monday, the Huskies had outscored their opponents by an average of 36 points per game. Even following the loss, Connecticut remains tops in the nation in scoring (91.1 points) and scoring margin (32.4 points), third in field goal percentage (51.6 percent) and seventh in rebounding margin (9.4 boards).
The duo of Svetlana Abrosimova (20 points and 14 rebounds) and Sue Bird (17 points and 6 assissts) paced the Huskies. But fellow starters Ralph, Swin Cash (2-for-7 from the field for 7 points) and Kelly Schumacher (2 points and 3 rebounds in only 13 minutes) all struggled.
"I think our team is surprised when teams actually play really, really good against us," Auriemma said. "That's how immature some of our players are. They would rather phone ahead and say `By the way, here we come and we would like the score to be 52-30 at halftime so could you please go along with that?' And when it doesn't go like that, we're not quite sure how to deal with it this year. That's the crux of what we're going through right now."
The Irish are experiencing far different circumstances. Yet a mid-January win does not guarantee future success in the postseason. The two teams do not meet again in the regular season but may play in the Big East final on Connecticut's home floor. Round Three may come in the NCAA tournament.
But for now, the Irish can stake claim as the conference's top team.
All Sports Stories for Wednesday, January 17, 2001
