The greatest shooters in basketball “have no conscience.” I sat through games when KML bricked her first five 3-pt shots and then went on a tear hitting shot after shot. I’ve watched games where Katie Lou couldn’t throw the ball in the ocean and then, if my magic, everything started to fall for her. Having a shooters mindset is critical to being a great shooter.
Following the UConn
“Exhibition Game” vs Pecs, Hungary there was considerable chatter on the BY about Azzi’s 9 for 31 shooting performance, with lots of questions and concerns about both the volume of shots that she took as well as the number of shots that she missed. I finally watched the game last night and I have a personal observation.
While I have no inside information on what Geno discussed with Azzi and the team before the game, it appears quite apparent that UConn was conducting something I will refer to as the
Azzi experiment. The evidence is quite simple. Azzi is a consummate team player who always takes her shots in rhythm during the flow of the game. During the game against Pecs, Azzi shot the ball every time she had a sliver of space and several times when she was covered.
Azzi was catching and releasing the ball faster than I have ever seen her. She was taking and making some shots from “Caitlin Clark” territory. UConn, who typically runs a beautiful motion offense, was often just getting the ball to Azzi and letting her fire away. One action the Huskies ran over and over was to have Nika bring the ball up and dribble to the wing, where she would simply hand the ball to Azzi at the arc, who then fired away. Azzi made 9 pretty remarkable shots. Of course, she also missed 22 shots.
Normally, if any UConn player was firing away and missing as much as Azzi was against Pecs, she would earn herself a spot on the bench. But throughout the game, both Azzi and Geno appeared completely unfazed by the volume of missed shots. Hence, my conclusion that the shooting spree by Azzi was a plan by Geno to get Azzi to be more aggressive and comfortable taking over on the offensive end.
As I said in the postgame thread, I doubt that Azzi will ever take 31 shots or miss 22 shots in a regular season game. But having watched the Pecs game, it seems absolutely apparent that Geno wants Azzi to be far more aggressive on offense, and when she is matched up again on the court with her BFF, the show that is UConn WBB will be something to behold.
