Moments after knocking off UCLA on Friday night, Arizona’s second win over a ranked opponent this season, Tommy Lloyd was asked by a sideline reporter how he’d reward his team. His answer: a crosscountry
trip to play a team that has won two national titles this decade.
The 4th-ranked Wildcats continued their tough early-season schedule with a visit to No. 3 UConn on Wednesday night. The Huskies (4-0) won championships in 2023 and 2024 before losing to eventual champ Florida in the second round of last year’s NCAA tournament.
It will be the 7th meeting between the schools, first since 2012 when Arizona won in Hartford.
This will also be the Wildcats’ second Top 3 opponent, following the opener against No. 3 Florida, only the third time in school history they’ve faced multiple Top 3 teams in nonconference play. It’s the first time where both are in the first five games of the season.
The first 10 minutes
Arizona is 4-0 but it has trailed early in every game, including to Utah Tech and NAU. The Wildcats were down 12 to Florida just over seven minutes into the season opener and on Friday were down 10 to UCLA with 13:12 left in the first half.
The UA ended up going ahead each time before halftime, leading Florida by six and UCLA by three, but it’s a pattern that can’t continue if it expects to stay in the win column. UConn’s four wins have seen it lead by an average of 23.5 points at the half, including by 11 against BYU on Saturday in Boston in a game it trailed in less than five minutes in.
Part of what could be contributing to Arizona’s slow starts is Tommy Lloyd’s choice to go with freshman Dwayne Aristode over Anthony Dell’Orso. Dell’Orso had a game-high 20 off the bench against UCLA, entering for the first time with the Wildcats down 11-5.
The Bruins upped the lead to 15-5 before Dell’Orso scored eight points during a 14-3 run to put Arizona in front.
Lloyd seems intent on sticking with Dell’Orso and Tobe Awaka as reserve weapons, and so far it’s paid off down the stretch. Arizona had a 28-3 edge in bench points against UCLA, and under Lloyd the Wildcats are 79-19 when leading in bench scoring.
UConn’s many weapons
The NBA Draft and the transfer portal make it so most teams have to replace the bulk of their rotation each year. Arizona was among the luckier ones in that it returned three starters, plus Motiejus Krivas, and in the games against Florida and UCLA those returners have logged more than 56 percent of the minutes.
That pales in comparison to UConn, which has three of its top four scorers back from a year ago including 6-foot-8 forward Alex Karaban, who was a starter on both the Huskies’ national championship teams. UConn is ranked 12th in Division I in minutes continuity, per KenPom.
Karaban and junior guard Solo Ball are on the preseason watch list for the Wooden Award, given to college basketball’s top player. Arizona’s Koa Peat is on there as well, yet Jaden Bradley somehow missed that cut like he did for the Bob Cousy Award preseason watch list for the nation’s best point guard.
UConn’s leading scorer and rebounder is 6-foot-10 senior Tarris Reed, who is averaging 20 points and 9.3 rebounds on 74.2 percent shooting. And junior guard Silas Demary is averaging 13 points and 6.3 assists while shooting 62.1 percent including better than 70 percent on 2-pointers.
The Huskies are shooting 65.3 percent from 2 and 40.2 from 3, with Karaban making 12 of 19 from outside.
More growing pains?
Peat and Kharchenkov had tremendous college debuts against Florida, with Peat dropping 30—second-most for a UA player in his first game—while dominating All-American Alex Condon and Kharchenkov posting a double-double. But against UCLA, the next quality opponent they faced, that pair both struggled on offense.
The same went for Brayden Burries and Dwayne Aristode, as now that there’s film on each freshman opponents are able to game plan for them. Peat had six turnovers in 21 minutes against UCLA while Burries was 1 for 9 (1 for 6 from 3) and for the season is shooting 31.6 percent with a 17.6 percent turnover rate.
All but one player in UConn’s rotation is in their third season of college basketball or more. The Huskies’ average Division I experience of 2.55 years is 12th-best nationally, per KenPom.
A true road environment
This will be Arizona’s third game away from McKale Center but the first one where it will truly be the enemy. T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas again proved to be McKale North, while the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles may have also had as many Wildcat fans as ones there to cheer for UCLA.
Not the case on Wednesday night. Gampel Pavilion, which is on the UConn campus and holds 10,244, is sold out and will probably only have a smaller section for Arizona fans. It’s a White Out and $2 Miller Lite night, so rowdiness is very possible.
UConn normally hosts many of its most high-profile games at the PeoplesBank Arena in Hartford. This will be the first matchup of Top 5 teams it has hosted on campus since 2006.
Arizona is 28-16 in true road games under Lloyd, going 2-2 in nonconferenec road games with wins at Illinois in 2021 and Duke in 2023. The Wildcats are 4-4 in road games against ranked opponents under Lloyd.
UConn is 54-8 at Gampel Pavilion under Danny Hurley, older brother of ASU coach Bobby Hurley, and has won 36 consecutive nonconference home games combined between Gampel and PeoplesBank.
