Connecticut Gets It Together to Finish Off Iowa and Davis

To the list of many qualities belonging to talented and smart Connecticut, add a temper.

The remaining teams in the NCAA basketball tournament might have noticed this Thursday thanks to Iowa, which discovered what happens when you push and shove and fight the Huskies.

The Huskies push and shove and fight back.

In a game featuring a halftime tussle and frequent bumping, top-seeded Connecticut held off Iowa, 78-68, to advance to the West Regional final against Gonzaga on Saturday.

Where the same thing awaits.

“Cinderella’s slipper broke a long time ago,” Connecticut Coach Jim Calhoun said of Gonzaga. “I don’t buy that. I don’t buy it.”

After Thursday’s scrimmage, the Huskies will be ready.

“I thought we were back in the Big East, this was like a Big East brawl,” Calhoun said. “[Iowa] battled us all over the court. If they play that way, you can’t complain about them. You have to adjust.”

So the Huskies (31-2) adjusted with every Iowa run.

Connecticut took a seven-point lead late in the first half . . . fell behind by one point early in the second half . . . then broke a 53-all tie to end the final 10 minutes on a 25-15 run.

All of this was sandwiched around a incident that featured Connecticut’s 5-foot-10 Khalid El-Amin running up to challenge Iowa’s 6-foot-5 Joey Range as the teams left the floor at halftime.

They shoved, they yapped, they appeared ready to brawl before teammates broke them up.

The obvious reason for the fight was a smack delivered to El-Amin’s shoulder by Range moments earlier as the two passed each other on the court.

But the real reason was El-Amin’s desire to support teammates who had been treated similarly in the first half.

This included a bumping match between Connecticut’s Edmund Saunders and Iowa’s Jess Settles.

“It was just something that happened in the heat of the moment,” El-Amin said. “[Range] gave me an extra shove. I didn’t care for it. I returned the greeting to him.”

The scrums continued until late in the game, when Iowa’s Jacob Jaacks wouldn’t let Connecticut’s Kevin Freeman loose during a rebound bearhug.

When they finally separated, Freeman slapped at him.

But by then, with the Huskies leading, 64-57, the point had been made.

“We didn’t want to be out there talking trash to them,” said forward Richard Hamilton, who led the Huskies in scoring as usual with 24 points. “We didn’t want to talk about it, we wanted to be about it.”

Hamilton said that his team decided to fight back in ways even more impressive than El-Amin’s challenge to Range.

“If they wanted to use cheap shots, we wanted to get turnovers, score easy baskets, doing things like that to retaliate.”

So while Iowa (20-10) outrebounded Connecticut, 32-26, the Huskies won the battle of turnovers, 12-15, while outscoring Iowa, 14-4, on the fastbreak.

After it ended, with Connecticut connecting on a championship-like 14 of 16 free throws in the final minutes, an era also ended.

Dr. Tom Davis, Iowa’s coach, was ending his 13-year career there after university officials decided last spring to not renew his contract.

“I don’t know if I’ve ever put more into a team than this team,” Davis said sadly when asked about his future. “I’ve got to regroup. I don’t know how long it’s going to take. This really wipes you out.”

While it was not surprising that Calhoun spent several moments hugging and consoling Davis afterward, many were impressed that Hamilton did the same thing.

“I just told him I admired him for sticking with it this year,” Hamilton said. “He told us to keep going. To keep going.”