STORRS – Dan Hurley thought the holiday break could have potentially been one day longer for the UConn men’s basketball team, but it was long enough for most players to get home for a few days with family and return refreshed and healthy ahead of their next road trip to Xavier on New Year’s Eve.
“It’s been good to get people a lot of reps in practice, Braylon (Mullins) getting a lot of reps, Tarris (Reed Jr.) getting a lot of reps. It’s been good to have everybody in there,” Hurley said. “Solo (Ball) has been back. The team is as healthy as we’ve looked.”
Mullins never stopped getting reps, even on Christmas Day when he and his brothers kept up their tradition of getting into their high school gym at Greenfield Central in Indiana and putting up shots, which they’ve done since the Covid pandemic. Reed was able to take a bit of a break from basketball and continue getting back to full strength and Ball, who missed the Dec. 21 game at DePaul with a wrist injury, came back ready to go.
Missing the first game of his career due to injury, Ball’s absence was felt in Chicago as the team missed 13 of its first 16 shots from the field without its go-to shotmaker, particularly early in games.
“Solo being out of there from an offensive standpoint, we do a lot of things to get Solo opportunities. So having a guy not in there, especially with the way he played at DePaul the year before (22 points, 7-for-9 from 3) and the way he played in that Butler game (career-high 26 points), looking like his sophomore-year self,” Hurley said.
“But he’s been able to get healthy and he’s had four straight days of practice, he’ll get a fifth day (Tuesday), so he’ll be ready to go.”
UConn’s staff has been preparing Mullins to be able to get some of the same looks that have typically gone to Ball, off of some of the same actions in their half court offense. He is still learning where he fits best in the loaded nine-man rotation and adjusting to the Huskies’ system.
“In practice it’s kind of just like a plug in and try things out,” Mullins said. “I’m playing different spots, playing things I haven’t played before. I’m learning, that’s the only thing I’m here to do, just learn and grow and be the best player I can be.”
Through seven college games since he recovered from offseason ankle and knee injuries, Mullins is averaging 9.3 points and 2.9 rebounds per game, shooting 33.3% from beyond the arc and holding his own on the defensive end. His potential one-and-done, first-round talent has shown through in spurts, and Hurley believes his impact will only continue to grow as the season goes on.
“If you look at where Steph (Castle) was on Dec. 29 of his freshman year, both of those men dealt with injuries, but Steph really didn’t start to hit his stride until after the new year and then as January turned to February, February to March, then he was a monster,” Hurley said. “So I just think with Braylon right now, missing that time, he’s gonna turn it up in a similar way to the way Steph did.
“He’s still trying to figure out the offense, how to use screens, where to find his opportunities, get to know his teammates. His teammates have got to find him because he’s explosive and we’ve got to get him going.”
Just over a third of the way through the regular season, UConn has made its case as one of the best teams in the country and it has yet to play a full, 40-minute game with everyone at their best. The break came at a perfect time after a brutal nonconference schedule, through which the team went 11-1 with four Quad 1A wins before jumping right into Big East play.
After the New Year’s Eve game, the Huskies will have five games in 14 days, three of which are on the road.
“There’s nothing that we’ve done that makes me, like, not confident in the group,” Hurley said. “When you have the type of wins we’ve had. … it makes you feel like your team has got a real chance. But you don’t know if you have a great team until you get to late-February and March, when you’ve gotten through conference play and you’ve performed like the ’24 team did where you truly know you’ve got a great team.
“Big East conference games are always going to be tough, no matter what anyone’s NET is, KenPom, any of those things. It’s a grind, it’s physical, you play in tough environments and you play against great coaches.”
