It’s already time for UConn basketball to worry after 0-2 start

Not even a week into the season, it already seems time to press the panic button in Storrs. UConn has lost its first two games of the season for the first time since 1968-69, dropping a pair of buy games to Wagner and Northeastern on Friday and Monday.

It doesn’t get easier from here either, as the Huskies play at Loyola Marymount next, then face a stacked Maui Invitational field that includes North Carolina, Oregon, and Wisconsin.

The good news is that it will provide UConn with plenty of opportunities to make up for its early struggles. The bad news is that those two losses raised some red flags that need to be addressed before the season spirals out of control.

One could say UConn’s shooting over the first two games was unsustainably bad. The raw numbers are staggering: 38 percent from the field, 62 percent from the line, and 28 percent from three. That adds up to an effective field goal percentage of 42 percent.

Rodney Purvis, the Huskies’ leading returning scorer from last year, has struggled more than anyone, tallying just 12 total points in two games and making 2 of 10 three-point attempts. As the team has struggled, he has settled for bad shots. He’s also continued to have a problem finishing at the rim — an issue that seems to have translated to the entire team.

Vance Jackson, the freshman who was supposed to be the knockdown shooter UConn was missing last year, can still develop into that role, but he has not had much of an opportunity yet. The one bright spot may be Terry Larrier, the transfer from VCU, who has averaged 18 points over the first two games and has single-handedly kept UConn competitive in each.

The extent of UConn’s struggles from the field is a surprise. The lack of contributions from its big men, however, is a frighteningly predictable problem. In 2013-14, Amida Brimah showed great promise as a raw, but talented freshman, as he played a key role in UConn’s surprise national championship. Three years later, he appears to be the same player. He can dominate overmatched teams defensively, and did that for stretches against Northeastern, but has never turned into an offensive contributor and, more importantly, has never become even an average rebounder.

To be fair, Brimah was hampered by injuries in his career, but his lack of development has been a major disappointment and is a black mark on the resume of the UConn coaching staff.

To a lesser extent, the same could be said of senior Kentan Facey. Facey, a former top-100 recruit, has played well for stretches, but never learned how to stay on the floor for an extended period of time. Steve Enoch has only played single-digit minutes over the first two games and Juwan Durham, a highly touted recruit still working his way back from injury, does not appear ready to contribute just yet.

UConn is a guard-heavy team that does not need to dominate inside, but getting absolutely no contributions from within has been a serious problem, particularly with guys like Purvis struggling in the backcourt.

Perhaps the one problem that UConn knows will improve over time is its lack of experience. Purvis and Brimah are both seniors, but other than that, the team is relying entirely on freshmen and sophomores.

Jalen Adams entered the season with (perhaps unfairly) high expectations and has not appeared ready to take over the team. That shouldn’t be a shock — he’s a sophomore who spent last season playing behind Purvis and Sterling Gibbs.

McDonald’s All-American Alterique Gilbert has shown flashes of utter brilliance, but like any freshman point guard, has also shown a knack for head-scratching plays. Take, for example, a couple ill-advised lob attempts while UConn was trying to come back against Northeastern on Monday. You take the bad with the good with Gilbert, however, because his potential is so high. One has to expect he will improve quickly.

When a team struggles, a certain amount of responsibility always falls on the coaching staff. Now is not the time to call for Kevin Ollie’s head, but there are questions he has to answer.

First: Is the lack of development in the frontcourt a product of the team not having a true big-man coach over the past four years? If so, why was this not remedied in the offseason when Karl Hobbs left for Rutgers? Ollie is an accomplished guard who can connect with his backcourt in a way that perhaps other coaches can’t. There doesn’t seem to be anyone who can do the same with someone like Brimah.

It’s also unclear why UConn often appears unprepared to execute on offense. Given how poorly the team is shooting and how inept the bigs seem to be offensively, facing a zone should not come as a surprise, yet it always seems to be. One solution would be to allow Larrier to use his mid-range game to keep the defense honest or work his way inside. Instead, too many possessions have ended with forced threes or one of the big men launching a fade-away 8 feet from the basket, leaving him out of position to rebound. This has been a constant problem over the last few years and has made the Huskies easy to scout. Ollie’s tendency to over-manage his lineups has only appeared to aggravate the team’s offensive problems.

Ollie deserves a ton of credit for his work at UConn over his first two seasons —from how he guided the team through the turmoil of an APR ban to that NCAA Tournament run. He has earned the benefit of the doubt as he has learned how to be a head coach. But if UConn doesn’t turn this around, his seat is going to heat up. Outside of two magical months, UConn hasn’t had a dominant season since 2009 and fans in Connecticut expect more.