ARLINGTON, Texas – Kentucky freshman Aaron Harrison has become the darling of the NCAA tournament or, depending on your perspective, a devil in a Wildcat blue uniform. His deep, deep 3-pointer with 5.7 seconds left Saturday night lifted Kentucky past Wisconsin and into Monday night’s national championship game against Connecticut.
Harrison is breaking hearts across the country. He is on the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine this week, terrorizing Michigan in the Elite Eight with a near carbon copy of the jumper. That one came with 2.3 seconds remaining. And two days before that he hit the go-ahead shot in a victory over Louisville.
UConn guard Ryan Boatright has studied the film of Harrison. That’s the kind of thing Boatright does in preparation for every game. On Sunday, as the two championship finalists met with the media, the Huskies’ defensive star virtually guaranteed that Harrison’s streak of game-winners is over.
“He’s a great player and those are great shots,” Boatright said. “If you watch his last two games, he hit the same shot at the same time from the same spot. If you’re up two, you gotta run him off the 3-point line. You take the two points, you go to overtime. No matter what, you don’t let him get a 3-point shot off. In that situation, I would’ve known what to do. I wouldn’t have let him get that that three off.”
What would Boatright have done?
“You just would have gotten up in him,” he said. “He didn’t even dribble the ball. They gave him his space, he squared it up and he just shot it in rhythm. They just gave him too much space and he knocked that shot down from the same place he hit it before.”
UConn guard Ryan Boatright has been the defensive star of the tournament (Ken Davis photo)
Boatright’s tone of voice was part amusement and part disbelief. Shabazz Napier may be UConn’s leader and DeAndre Daniels may be playing himself into a high spot in the NBA draft, but Boatright is the defensive stopper for UConn. He has been the most disruptive force in the tournament and continued that trend against Florida’s Scottie Wilbekin Saturday night in UConn’s 63-53 victory.
“Right now, he is just an absolute terror,” UConn assistant coach Karl Hobbs said of Boatright. “He’s making guys want to pass the ball. Guys are struggling just getting over halfcourt. He’s been the difference as far as our defense goes [throughout the tournament].”
Great defense is part of the UConn heritage established during the Jim Calhoun era. There have certainly been stretches this season when the Huskies have lived up to that reputation. But the defensive effort for the first five games of the NCAA tournament has been extraordinary and it has carried the Huskies to the national championship game.
Since the overtime win over Saint Joseph’s, UConn hasn’t had a nail-biter. UConn has outscored its opponents by 41 points and the Huskies possess a +32 margin in points off turnovers. UConn is holding its NCAA opponents to 39.7 percent shooting. No one expected that when the NCAA tournament began.
Against Michigan State, UConn kept the Spartans from throwing the ball inside. Saturday against Florida, the goal was to force the Gators to play on just one side of the court and keep them out of the lane. Florida point guard Scottie Wilbekin left the game early in the second half, reportedly because of leg cramps.
“We were watching TV [Saturday night],” Boatright said. “As much as I put into the game and as hard as I played defense, a lot of people were saying Scottie Wilbekin didn’t play well because his knees hurt. Maybe his knees were hurting. But at the same time, they’re still not giving us the credit we deserve.”
Film review, scouting reports, detecting tendencies have all been part of UConn’s success. The Huskies listen to a coaching staff that includes Hobbs and associate head coach Glen Miller, both former UConn guards.
Hobbs said he was “sworn to secrecy” and couldn’t reveal the new wrinkle. It’s obvious the challenge will be bigger for Boatright, listed at 6-0, and Napier, 6-1, in the backcourt. Kentucky’s freshmen guards, twins Aaron and Andrew Harrison, are both 6-6.
“God blessed them with height,” Boatright said.
But Boatright works under the same basic premise. His goal is to impact the game by getting into the opposing offense. He said the constant disruption makes the opponent “naturally irritated and tired.”
“If you’re a ballhandler, you don’t want somebody constantly up in you the entire game. Making them uncomfortable is making them go side to side when he’s bringing the ball up. If you can take him off that, he’s the point guard and their offense isn’t going to run that smooth.”
“I just think he raised his level of intensity, raised his level of focus,” Hobbs said. “You could begin to see it even in practice. After that loss, Ryan knew that he could play better. He knew that he could make an impact on the game, not only offensively but defensively. That’s been the difference.”
UConn entered the tournament with a reputation as one-man team with Napier receiving All-American accolades. That has been debunked, in large part because Napier and Boatright have formed another of those famous UConn point guard tandems.
“We’ve developed a formula that’s been very successful,” Hobbs said. “It goes back to Kevin Ollie and Doron Sheffer. And then it went to Ricky Moore and Khalid El-Amin. These two guys fall into the same kind of category. It makes it very difficult for teams to defend those guys. I think they’ve bought into the fact that this is how we play. They’ve embraced that and taken it to a whole other level.”
That has been an evolving story for three seasons. It wasn’t easy for either one at first. When Napier was injured last season, Boatright was criticized for sloppy ball handling, sometimes trying to do too much, and taking bad shots.
And two seasons ago, the two guards really didn’t get along at all.
“No, not at all,” Boatright said when reminded that it didn’t come easy. “My freshman year, it was tough. I was used to having the ball all the time and making plays. As a kid, and immature, you come in thinking it’s all about you. Shabazz will tell you he wasn’t the best leader at that time. He had stuff he had to work on.
“We bumped heads a lot. Both being from inner-cities and being tough guys, we didn’t back down too much. We had some rough practices. Both of us want to win. That’s the main thing. So going out there every day and putting that jersey on, we just bonded. If you’ve been watching us the last few years, you know me and Bazz have a lot of heart. We’re not going to back down from anybody.”
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