I’m starting to wonder if the UConn Huskies are better without Jerome Dyson. Consider that UConn’s three best performances on the season came when Dyson played limited minutes.
-Dyson was suspended in the Huskies road win at Indiana.
-Dyson picked up his second foul just 5 and a half minutes into the Marquette game and watched as his team built a 39-24 halftime lead in the upset win. It was Dyson’s second fewest minutes in Big East play.
-Dyson picked up his fourth foul early in the second half of the Georgetown game and watched the majority of the game from the sidelines as UConn lost by only 3 points at Georgetown. It was Dyson’s fewest minutes in Big East play.
Dyson has a terrible assist-to-turnover ratio (currently 0.78). His one redeeming quality is that he is one of the top steals getters in the country. But steals are a two-sided coin. If you take too many chances to get those steals, you don’t really help your team. Dyson also leads the Huskies in %Shots according to Pomeroy, despite being one of the least efficient shooters on the team. He’s taken 70 three pointers and made only 22. I can understand a point guard having a slightly lower three point percentage because he needs to take shots with the shot-clock winding down. That’s AJ Price. But, the numbers seem to indicate that Dyson takes too many bad shots, and if his defensive strategy is too risky, maybe the Huskies really are better off without him.
Post Louisville Update
Chalk up another great game for Connecticut without Dyson. I’m not saying UConn doesn’t need Dyson and Wiggins for depth. (The Huskies sure looked winded with 7 minutes to go in the Louisville game.) But if I were Jim Calhoun, I’d seriously consider bringing Dyson off the bench and limiting his minutes the rest of the year.
Of course you couldn’t watch Monday’s game without asking why Louisville took 33 three point shots. I love this quote which I’m stealing from BP. “It's a chip shot, the three point shot in college basketball. If you're wide open and you don't take a chip shot, you're not a good basketball team.”-Rick Pitino. True, but if your players keep taking shots they can’t make, they probably aren’t very good either.