University of Connecticut Athletics
Gordon Leads UConn in a Second Half Run Over Lehigh
12/1/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
HARTFORD, CT (December 1, 2003) -- Junior guard Ben Gordon scored 19 points and snatched a career-high five steals to propel third-ranked Connecticut to a 75-55 victory over Lehigh before a crowd of 16,103 at the Hartford Civic Center.
The Huskies’ record improves to 5-1 on the season while the Mountain Hawks drop to 1-3.
UConn started quickly, scoring the games first seven points, as Lehigh missed its first six shots from the field. The Huskies led 9-2, and 19-12 before the Mountain Hawks battled back to knot the score at 24 apiece on a jumper by Dayne Mickleson. Lehigh had the ball once with a chance to take the lead, but couldn’t convert and sophomore guard Rashad Anderson hit two free throws to key a 13-2 half-ending run. Gordon had five points and Anderson four in the decisive spurt. UConn shot just 39% (11 of 28) in the first twenty minutes and committed nine turnovers. The Huskies led 37-26 at intermission, despite five made three-pointers by Lehigh.
Lehigh was able to stay close until the Huskies’ put them away with a 22-7 run over 9:40 midway through the second half. Anderson capped the run with back-to-back three pointers to give UConn an insurmountable 61-38 lead with 8:05 to play.
Gordon finished the game by making six of 11 from the field, and made six of eight from the foul line. Anderson finished with 14 points, while sophomore guard Denham Brown added 13 and grabbed a game-high eight rebounds. Junior center Emeka Okafor scored 10 points and grabbed six rebounds. Freshman power forward Josh Boone scored eight points, grabbed six boards and tied his career-high with five blocks. Senior point guard Taliek Brown had six points, six assists and just one turnover.
The Huskies shot better in the second half, connecting on 55% (16 of 29) of their shots, to finish at 47% (27 of 57) for the game. UConn outrebounded the Mountain Hawks, 41-30, and outscored their opponents 36-20 in the paint.
Jose Olivero came off the bench to score 17 points for Lehigh.
The Huskies will return to action on Saturday, December 6, when they play Army at the Harry A. Gampel Pavilion in Storrs. Tip-off is set for 7:00 p.m. and the game will be televised locally by WTXX-TV20.
POST GAME QUOTES
UConn Head Coach Jim Calhoun
Obviously, I would have liked us to play a little bit sharper. Not necessarily better, but a little sharper. It was not as intense and we didn’t seem as hungry as we did against Utah - but that was an exceptional game. It’s hard to make a real determination of exactly where I put this game in context. At a couple of points, Lehigh tried to take some time off the clock and make us play a halfcourt game. I think we should have stayed with defense for longer periods of time. I thought we really had a good minutes game tonight, but just didn’t have as good a game as I would have liked. Against Utah, until the last 4 minutes, we were really, really good. Tonight, we just didn’t have as many good minutes. As the schedule moves in another direction, we’re going to have to play - we have no choice - not minutes, not moments, but games
We played well enough to do some of the things we would like, but certainly not long enough to accomplish what I wanted for the game tonight. That’s really the best way to say it. We have to improve every day. I’m not so sure that we took a step backwards - as a matter of fact, I know we didn’t - but I don’t think we took any giant step forward, either.
I thought we gave Lehigh a lot of confidence. Billy had his kids well-prepared.
On Emeka
I would give a pass to Emeka. I don’t think he was himself. He was less involved, although he still did a good job hedging and caused a lot of turnovers.
On Josh Boone
Josh, to some degree, blocked shots, but he wasn’t really exploding as much as I would like to see.
Ben Gordon
On the lull after the quick start
We got real laid back, stopped play defense, we didn’t run any offense, and we let them stick around.
We were missing a lot of easy lay-ups and jump shots we normally make. So, it definitely wasn’t easy. But we just compounded that by not playing hard enough on defense.
On Coach being upset with the team’s poor play
He had a right to be. Coach is a person who wants everybody to play as hard as they can. We were out there playing hard, but we weren’t playing smart.
On playing defense
You have to get yourself in a mindset that ‘I’m going to lock my man up.’ That’s something you have to force yourself to do every night until it becomes natural.
Was it frustrating out there?
It’s frustrating when you’re not playing offense well or defense well. And that’s how we started the game out. We missed a lot of easy lay-ups and we just weren’t guarding people on the other end.
On the run at the end of the 1st half
I thought we stepped it up just a notch.
Why the 1st half struggles in some games
Anytime something like that happens, I think it’s the guards’ fault. I think myself and the other guards have to set the tone first defensively and everything will flow from that offensively because control the tempo of the game.
Did you take Lehigh for granted?
We definitely played like it. I don’t think we went into the game thinking we were going to come in and win by 40, but we played like we had that attitude. Actions speak louder than words. We need to take a totally different approach to games like this.
Denham Brown
On the technical foul…was it frustration?
No, I was just talking a little bit too much.
On the play of Lehigh
They played a good game overall
On the sluggish first half play again: It looks like something we need to work on. We need to be more focused in practice. It is a bad habit right now. We’ve just got to break through. I don’t think that is going to happen too much longer.
On if extenuating circumstances (Villanueva, injuries, polls) are affecting the team’s play
Me personally I don’t go for that. I just notice the 4 other guys that are on the court at that specific time, that’s what my focus is on. I’m not focusing on guys injuries, or things like that. Emeka’s back (is injured) and he’s out there so he’s got to put in his work regardless of what is going on. On the court we just have one goal, and that is to win the ballgame.
On the 2nd half
We just tried to pick up our defensive intensity, get the ball into the post more, and the guards got better shots and they started to drop.
Rashad Anderson
We don’t play to our ability some times. I have yet to see us play 40 minutes of basketball yet. I think it’s all mental, just digging in mentally.
Head Coach Billy Taylor
I was really proud of the way our guys competed. We came out and we tried to execute our game plan, which was not to get into an uptempo contest with Connecticut. They have terrific players that can get out and run the floor, and really hurt you there in transition. We wanted to try to, as much as possible, control tempo, give them some different looks, hopefully try to keep them off balance a little bit and make some shots, make some plays on the offensive end. I was proud of our effort. Disappointed that we lost, but I like a lot of things that we did tonight.
They have great size, tremendous shooters and ballhandlers, athleticism and depth. They’re a tremendous team. They certainly deserved to be ranked number one in the country and I’m sure they’ll get back there again quickly. And they’re well-coached. Coach Calhoun does a great job having his guys prepared and getting them to play hard. For us it was “Can we follow and execute our game plan? Can we play our style of basketball and come in a be successful?
That was main key for us - to get open shots. Try to work the ball offensively and try to get a good look every time down the floor. We struggled early on - we had some good shots that we missed - then we started to get a little bit into a rhythm offensively. Even in our cold spurts, I liked the shots we were getting. If we could have cut down on our turnovers - some of our longer passes - I would have really liked our offensive performance.
Senior Guard Ra Tiah
We were just a little bit too excited out there, coming into UConn, the number one ranked team. Everybody tried to do more than they usually do. And we weren’t patient on offense. We put the ball on the floor too much, didn’t look to see guys open. Coach told us to slow it down. They were going to make their runs, we came into the game expecting that, so we just tried to get the best shots that we could.
We were thinking we could win the game, even though nobody else expected us to be in that mind frame…We just tried to stay close and put the pressure on them.
