No. 11 UConn coasts to 81-68 win over DePaul

Field Level Media|published: Wed 1st January, 16:32 2025

Dec 8, 2024; Austin, Texas, USA; Connecticut Huskies guard Solo Ball (1) reacts after scoring a three point basket during the first half against the Texas Longhorns at Moody Center. Mandatory Credit: Scott Wachter-Imagn Images

Solo Ball swished a career-best seven 3-pointers en route to 22 points, and Alex Karaban had 18 points and seven rebounds to boost No. 11 UConn to an 81-68 win against host DePaul on Wednesday in Chicago.

Samson Johnson scored 10 points and Hassan Diarra dished nine assists for the Huskies, who shot 48.4 percent compared to 39.6 percent for the Blue Demons.

Conor Enright contributed 18 points and nine assists for DePaul, while Jacob Meyer (12 points) and N.J. Benson (10) also finished in double figures.

UConn (11-3, 3-0 Big East) maintained a stranglehold in its series against DePaul (9-5, 0-3). The Huskies improved to 20-1 against the Blue Demons, whose lone victory over UConn came on Jan. 31, 2007.

DePaul's Big East regular season losing streak stretched to 35 games.

DePaul trailed by as many as 22 points and never led but capitalized on a Huskies shooting swoon midway through the second half as UConn adjusted to a right ankle sprain that took starter Liam McNeeley (nine points, six rebounds) out of the game.

A 7-0 Blue Demons run, fueled by attacking the basket and getting to the free throw line, closed the gap to 61-52 with 7:58 to go.

But the Huskies responded with a trio of 3-pointers over a 50-second span. Karaban delivered UConn's first field goal in more than five minutes when he connected at the 7:04 mark and bookended the spurt with a trey with 6:14 to go.

DePaul surrendered the first five points of the afternoon and eight of the first 10 after the Huskies and Blue Demons traded missed 3-pointers on their opening possessions.

Smooth offensive execution boosted the Huskies over the first 20 minutes, as they shot 48.6 percent from the field, including 53.3 percent from deep, to take a 43-22 lead into intermission.

Ball connected on 4 of 5 attempts from long range in the first half and was 7 of 9 for the game. He drilled a trey just before the buzzer on a feed from Diarra to cap a 6-0 run.

The Blue Demons shot just 26.9 percent in the first half, going 2-for-10 from long range.

Blue Demons forward David Skogman, the team's top rebounder, missed his second straight game with a lower-leg injury.

Diarra has contributed at least seven assists in six successive games.

--Field Level Media

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