Thabeet swats away Orange

The top two shot-blocking teams in the Big East got together in Syracuse on Wednesday night, and though the Orange combined for six blocks, Huskies center Hasheem Thabeet had seven by himself in UConn’s 63-61 win. Jim Calhoun went to a little-used 2-3 zone against a Syracuse team that saw the defense every day in practice. The difference is that, at Syracuse’s practices, there is not a 7-foot-3 giant in the middle of the paint to deflect and deter shots.

Thabeet was the primary reason why a Syracuse team that prefers to work in the interior — SU takes the second-fewest 3-pointers in the conference (UConn takes the fewest) — was unable to score enough points to win a game that was within its grasp.The opportunities were there. The second-best free-throw shooting team in the Big East during conference play, Connecticut hit only 8-of-16 attempts. Both of those numbers were low. The Huskies hit just 3-of-14 3-point attempts, a shot that they rarely like to attempt and only infrequently make (31.1 percent, 14th in the Big East). UConn hit a mediocre and identical 13-for-29 in both halves, good for just 44.8 percent. Still, Connecticut left central New York with its third straight road win because Syracuse was the team that couldn’t shoot straight.

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