No. 2 UConn men’s basketball lost to Dayton 85-67 in the seventh-place game to close out the Maui Invitational and fall to 4-3 on the season. The Huskies hung tough with the Flyers for the first half but inconsistency and Dayton’s dominance on the boards led to the largest loss for UConn in this tournament.
Both teams started slow, with the third game in as many days seeming to take its toll. After a Solo Ball 3-pointer got scoring started, Dayton ripped off an 8-0 run. This was basically how the whole game proceeded. For every UConn bucket or run, Dayton managed to answer.
A three from Posh Alexander stretched the Dayton lead to seven with just under 10 minutes to play before Alex Karaban got hot from three. The redshirt junior hit four threes in the opening 20 minutes as part of his 15 first-half points and hit two in a row with five minutes left to help the Huskies regain the lead.
Dayton once again punched back, with Nate Santos sinking two free throws to tie things up before another Karaban three gave UConn a brief lead once again. From there, the Flyers tallied another 8-0 run as the Huskies failed to score just once from the field in the final four minutes of the half and took a seven-point lead into halftime.
UConn came out of the gates hot to start the second half, tying the game up on the back of a strong stretch from Hassan Diarra, who drilled a three as the shot clock expired to make it 43-43 three minutes into the second half. But Dayton once again punched back, carving up the Huskies’ defense and penetrating with ease to rattle off a 9-2 run that brought the Flyers’ lead back to seven.
Diarra was the sole bright spot offensively in the second half, scoring all 10 of his points in the final 20 minutes and adding three assists and three steals. His effort to get to the basket off the dribble opened up some shots on the perimeter, but the Huskies couldn’t get anything to gall. After shooting 6-16 from deep in the first half, UConn went cold in the second, shooting just 2-13 (15.4 percent) from three.
Meanwhile, Dayton continued to get quality looks at will on the offensive end. The Flyers shot 54.2 percent from the field, and guards Alexander, Malachi Smith, and Enoch Cheeks had no issues getting to the basket for easy buckets. UConn head coach Dan Hurley dropped the Huskies into a 1-3-1 zone at one point with about five minutes to play, but the damage had already been done. Another 7-0 run capped off with a Cheeks’ 3-pointer made it 69-57, effectively putting the Huskies away for good. The Flyers would stretch the lead to as much as 20 before a garbage-time layup from Ahmad Nowell cut it to 18.
UConn struggled to contain Dayton all night, as the Flyers did seemingly anything and everything they wanted to on the offensive end. Overall, Dayton shot 40 percent from three for the game owned the boards, and outrebounded the Huskies 41-25. The Flyers also got to the line early and often and capitalized on UConn’s sloppiness — Dayton was 27-30 from the charity stripe on the night, while the Huskies were just 7-11.
Karaban led all scorers with 21 points and was joined by Samson Johnson (12 points), Solo Ball (10), and Diarra in double figures. Only Jayden Ross, Tarris Reed, and Nowell scored in addition to the four in double figures for the Huskies, and freshman Liam McNeeley was 0-9 on the day but added five assists and four rebounds. Cheeks led the way for Dayton with 20 points, and Alexander finished the night with a season-high 16.
Overall, the Huskies’ trip to Maui was a failure. Instead of coming home with a trophy, UConn finished in eighth place out of eight teams and never looked like the No. 2 team in the country. Against higher-quality competition, UConn’s defensive struggles and fouling tendencies were magnified, and the Huskies’ high-powered offense couldn’t muster up the strength to overcome those flaws.
UConn has a few days off for Thanksgiving and travels back to the mainland before taking on Maryland-Eastern Shore, one of the worst teams in Division I. The Huskies face off against the Hawks on Saturday, Nov. 30 at the XL Center in Hartford, and the game can be found on Peacock.
