Matt Norlander delivers a Day 2 Notebook of the Maui Invitational, including interviews and anecdotes from the event’s greatest storytellers. This story will be continuously updated well into Tuesday evening.
LAHAINA, Hawaii – A chance in paradise has turned into a trip to hell for Dan Hurley’s UConn Huskies. The nation’s (not for long) No. 2 team is officially reeling after losing two games in two days by a total of three points against unranked opponents in the Maui Invitational.
“I just think we’re all shocked. We’re all stunned,” Hurley said as he walked to the team bus after UConn lost 73-72 to Colorado in the opening game of Tuesday’s consolation game at the Maui Invitational. “With the performance we have had and how well we have played, the games are very different for us and we have to be incredibly strong mentally at the moment.”
This week, UConn was 47-3 in its last 50 games. Now it is in danger of falling out of the rankings.
A day after blowing a 13-point lead against Memphis, Colorado steadily came back from an 11-point deficit to defeat the two-time champions. The margin of victory was provided by a cool right-handed runner from Andrej Jakimovski with 8.5 remaining. The Macedonian defeated UConn freshman Liam McNeeley. Jakimovski didn’t have to worry about a center frontman at that point, as for the second day in a row, UConn had its top two bigs, Samson Johnson and Tarris Reed Jr., foul fouls.
Here is the winning play. If this continues, we could have the best Maui Invitational ever.
The Huskies tried just like Solo Ball vs. Memphis for a game-saving 3-pointer, but this time Hassan Diarra’s attempt failed. The Buffs came in at No. 82 on the day KenPom.com. The Huskies had not dropped consecutive games since January 2023. Now they’ll try to avoid going 0-3 in Maui due to the mandate to play in the seventh spot, the final tipoff coming Wednesday night against Tuesday’s loser of Iowa State. Dayton game.
If you want a portion Hey!, check it out: Tuesday marked just the third time Colorado defeated a top-two team in program history (No. 2 Arizona in 2022, No. 2 Oklahoma State in 1992).
“The coach trusted me to make the final play and I knew I had to go there and finish,” Jakimovski said. “After a bad game yesterday, we showed character and played hard on defense. UConn is probably one of the best offensive teams I have played against in my college career.”
The Buffs will play the winner of Iowa State-Dayton on Wednesday.
Credit to Colorado, but the story is clearly UConn. As far as I am willing to take responsibility the patented Writer’s Jinxthe Huskies have bigger problems. And it isn’t only officiating, but yeah, Hurley took the time after the game on Tuesday to complain about that again. While McNeeley was called for an over-the-back foul against Memphis, which was Hurley’s breaking point, it was Colorado’s Trevor Baskin on Tuesday who made clear contact with McNeeley’s arm in an over-the-back scenario. No whistle. UConn led by one at the time.
“It just says how the last two days have gone for us, that yesterday the biggest play of the game was an over-the-back whistled against us, and today it was even more egregious because the boy Baskin pulled Liam’s arm .down,” Hurley said. “I’ve seen the replay of it. Obviously it’s ironic, but that’s not why our defense here has been so terrible, so terrible.”
Hurley has made himself a target by going after the officials after two close calls. As a result, he does not place full responsibility on himself and his players. To his point, UConn has lost two games in two days despite making 26 three-pointers on 61 attempts. That’s a rate of 42.6%, which will help you win a lot of games.
They’ve also allowed Memphis and Colorado to score at least 1.20 points per possession, losing a lot of games.
“Sometimes you don’t get a great whistle and I don’t think we got a great whistle here, it just didn’t come out that way,” Hurley said. “It killed us that so many guys got into trouble during the game.”
UConn has become so accustomed to rolling opponents that it has struggled to complete close tilts. With many new faces in prominent roles, despite Hurley’s standard, this isn’t surprising. But consider this: Colorado lost its top five scorers from a season ago. That didn’t stop Boyle’s Buffs, you know?
“Dealing with the kind of foul trouble we’ve had here certainly hasn’t helped a team with so many young guys replacing so many critical parts,” Hurley said. “It has made it even more challenging and has clearly exposed many of our vulnerabilities.”
We’re a long way from being in heavenly territory in Storrs, but after UConn thrived on feasting on every type of non-con opponent, it seems lost in its identity. Hurley told CBS Sports that he thought two losses in Maui were very much a possibility, even acknowledging it with a laugh.
“In particular, I would say we were most nervous about the guards’ play, where we lost what we lost [Tristen Newton] at that position,” Hurley told me. “I think we’re searching at this point.”
Hurley was without point guard Aidan Mahaney in the Huskies’ starting five for the first time this season, starting Hassan Diarra instead. Diarra had 11 points, six assists and two turnovers. Mahaney didn’t score.
“We really had to play out these last two games here because we were trying to find ourselves and it definitely knocked us on our butts,” Hurley said.
The major players who dropped out were also notable. Johnson and Reed Jr. were unavailable at critical time and Connecticut has handicapped the last two days. Hurley is humiliated, there’s no doubt about that. He said several times that his team deserved to be the preseason No. 1 seed based on what it had done the past two years. Now that has completely disappeared. UConn is just another team at this point and not even close to a top-10 team at this stage. With one more game against a good team guaranteed, the Huskies have a chance to somewhat salvage this trip late Wednesday night.
The alternative would be disastrous for the Huskies’ resume and would mark the first time the program has lost three straight games away from home since 2020.
Memphis’ Hunter is the best transfer in three weeks
This tournament always presents great opportunities for teams and players to rewrite expectations about their seasons. Consider: 2010-11 UConn and Kemba Walker; 2018-19 Dayton and Obi Toppin; and Gonzaga and Adam Morrison from 2005-2006, to name a few.
For two days, Memphis and Tyrese Hunter met those demands.
The Tigers’ 71-63 victory over Michigan State on Tuesday advanced the program to the Maui title game for the first time in school history. Obviously, Memphis was overlooked for not being ranked heading into the year. After snapping UConn’s 17-game winning streak on Monday and easily topping Michigan State today, Penny Hardaway’s team has five KenPom wins among the top 100. No other team can match that.
The biggest reason: Hunter’s blast from deep. The senior head guard is more than the breakout player in college basketball through the first three weeks of the season. He’s an All-American candidate, lifted by his stellar two-game run in Lahaina.
“I’m him! I’ve always been him!” Hunter shouted at his teammates after a beautiful parabola from more than 25 feet fell through in the second half of Memphis’ win against UConn. On Tuesday he provided a compelling encore.
‘Let everyone know. Notify them,” Hunter told me Tuesday. “Let them know I’m still here. It didn’t lead to anything.’
Hunter is averaging 24.5 points, just 1.5 turnovers and shooting 60% from deep (12 for 20) here in Maui. This season he has a comfortable career-best 17.3 points. He’ll do it alongside PJ Haggerty, giving the Tigers one of the best backcourts in the country and easily the best duo picked up in the portal last season (Hunter came from Texas, Haggerty via Tulsa).
What happened to Hunter? He was a volcano against UConn, and on Tuesday Tom Izzo described his 5-of-10 3-point barrage as “unfortunate.”
“He made some shots that… I don’t know if Penny made those shots when he played, and I mean that,” Izzo said. “He fell to his right, fell to his left, the end of the shot clock, and he drained them. Give them credit. There’s a reason they beat UConn.”
He is the easy favorite for Maui MVP heading into Wednesday. What has changed from his promising but inconsistent growth periods in Iowa State and Texas?
“You start by taking the right shots,” Hunter said of when to shoot 3-pointers. “As a freshman, I think I shot 27%. I was shooting shots that I would shoot in high school that you can’t shoot at the next level. … I was kind of immature with the shots I was shooting.”
Hunter developed a reputation as one of the best freshman defensive guards in the sport at ISU. He said there were some beautiful places in Texas, but also some “shaky things.”
“I think I sacrificed a lot as a player,” he told me.
He has found his niche, something he calls a niche, but he has more impact than that. The Memphis staff told me that Hunter’s maturity and leadership are the main reason this team is as good as it is. He accompanies Haggerty along the way. Something real is developing between the two and it has made the Tigers a potential top-10 team.
By admittedly being “a little more selfish,” Memphis has its best offense and three-point attack under Hardaway. The Tigers’ 45.4% 3-point clip ranks No. 3 nationally, boosted by Hunter’s hot-as-the-sun 52.6% accuracy from deep. There was a lot of offseason drama with this program, including bizarre staff layoffs and a still looming potential NCAA lawsuit.
“Everything I ever sacrificed was to win and I’m proud of it,” Hunter told me.
Now his bag is deep. He can move nimbly off the dribble, has a great snatch-back release, can hit accurately when playing from the corner, is pure on screen peels. I don’t know if there is a more fun player to watch in this young season than him.
“I’m free there and I don’t look over my shoulders,” Hunter said. “I know if I mess up, Coach has my back no matter what I have to do. I’m free of spirit.”