UConn overcomes McNeeley’s absence, 14-point hole with three-headed monster to top Providence

Dan Hurley and UConn continue to survive and advance, erasing 14-point deficit Sunday to defeat Providence and move to 4-0 in Big East play. (Photo by UConn Men’s Basketball)

STORRS, Conn. — As he has guided his UConn program through the rare quest for a third consecutive national championship, Dan Hurley has intimated on numerous occasions that this year’s iteration of the Huskies is dissimilar to either of the two outfits that reigned supreme on the first Monday in April in each of the past two seasons.

The personnel changes are the easiest difference to spot, the youth a close second. As the non-conference slate has unfolded into the resumption of Big East play, the other tangible antonym on the roster has been a desperation and wily veteran embodiment of the returning players’ refusal to give in.

Sunday afternoon afforded the latest example of the latter, on a day where Hurley was without a key component in star freshman Liam McNeeley, who missed his first game since injuring his ankle in Wednesday’s road win at DePaul.

After a first half in which UConn was thoroughly beaten to rebounds and loose balls by a Providence team coming off a decisive loss to Marquette on Friday, the Huskies used their physicality to draw fouls and bully their way back from a 14-point deficit. A 26-5 run—sparked mainly by Hassan Diarra, Aidan Mahaney and Tarris Reed, Jr.—flipped the script on the Friars and gave the reigning champions a double-digit lead in the waning moments of regulation. But Providence had one last rally to make things interesting, nearly coming back again but falling just short as UConn rang in its 2025 home opener with an 87-84 victory at a raucous Gampel Pavilion.

“We cheated death in this one here today,” Hurley deadpanned as the 11th-ranked Huskies (12-3, 4-0 Big East) won their eighth straight game since a November 27 loss to Dayton in the Maui Invitational. “We’re gonna have to win games in this type of manner. We’ve all been spoiled by the level of play in home games, and it’s just been a highlight reel. But this is a different team, especially with Liam out.”

“We’re frontrunners, we never come back,” he quipped as UConn overcame its largest deficit since wiping out an 18-point head start against Marquette four years ago today. “The game for us, obviously, was about Hassan Diarra and his will to not allow us to lose what would have been a rough game. He carried himself with the spirit and the will of a two-time national champion, and obviously Tarris’ second-half was huge.”

Diarra led the Huskies in more ways than one—with 19 points and eight assists to reflect his alpha status in the stat sheet while asserting himself on the floor—but it was Reed who was most instrumental in UConn’s comeback. A team-high plus-15 in just over 18 minutes of work, the Michigan transfer channeled the aggression Hurley has clamored for from his big man, and atoned for a missed assignment before the intermission by taking matters into his own hands down the stretch.

“The first half, I knew I wasn’t giving it my all, but at halftime, (Hurley) riled us up,” Reed said as he shared the impetus behind his resurgence. “Everyone was yelling, it was kind of chaotic, but you gotta find joy and peace through the chaos. That’s what I did. I knew I had to come out and really give it my all in order for us to win, so I went out there in the second half, locked in and tried to play like a Kodiak. (Hurley) asks me that question every day, so knowing if I could be that Kodiak bear, I could be dominant.”

“Tarris was awesome in the second half,” Hurley countered. “In the first half, he wasn’t ready to go. He missed a critical defensive rebound which allowed (Providence) to get a possession, and they hit a three to take a two-point lead. But the second half, he showed his impact, he made some awesome blocks and some timely buckets. He was a beast.”

Mahaney displayed an uncommon versatility on Sunday as well. Maligned at times this year for his lack of defense at points in relation to Hurley’s standard of perfection, the junior guard made up for it by playing three different positions alongside Diarra and Solo Ball throughout the afternoon, drawing praise from the coach in the process as he admitted he should have used Mahaney as a primary ball handler more.

“It would have made more sense to start him from the opener and just have him at that natural point guard position rather than to put a square peg in a round hole there,” Hurley reflected. “I thought you saw today he was on ball some, but for the majority of his minutes in the game, he was able to just kind of create offense, look for his three, go score the ball. I screwed up the early part of the season there.”

Regardless of where or how the Californian serves the Husky backcourt, the position is irrelevant as long as he takes care of his primary mission, aiding in the winning process.

“When you play with a point guard like Hass, that makes it easy,” Mahaney said. “They’re picking up 94 (feet) and not having to worry about it because you know he’s gonna take care of the ball, but I’m just here to help us win. If (Hurley) wants me to play the one, the two, it doesn’t matter to me at all as long as I’m trying to contribute to us winning. On ball, off ball, whatever. It doesn’t matter.”

Finally, there is Diarra. The senior leader knew he needed to shift gears with McNeeley projected to miss the next few weeks as he recovers, and the Corona native filled that role with 17 of his 19 points after the intermission.

“With Liam being out, obviously we need an offensive lift,” Diarra said. “Wherever I can be helpful, whether that’s facilitating or scoring the ball, I just wanted to come in with a mindset of being in attack mode and being aggressive.”

“Whatever you ask Hass to do, he goes and does it,” Hurley proclaimed. “And with Liam out, we need more production from Hass, and he asserted himself more in the game.”

The relationship between a coach and his point guard is arguably the most integral of any player-coach dynamic in a program. When the coach is a former point guard himself, the bond each side forges can be complex, and at times arduous. Shaheen Holloway demands more from his floor generals at Seton Hall, for instance, as does Hurley with whomever is entrusted with running his offense. He admitted as much when discussing how his rapport with Diarra has unfolded, but the senior is indebted to his leader for unwrapping a new facet of his own game.

“Coach never takes it easy on me,” Diarra conceded, cracking a smile. “He holds his point guards to a higher standard because the point guard is the head of the engine. Our relationship has grown the last three years, and I’m super appreciative of him. He’s grown my career to another level.”

His coach heaped plaudits on him several minutes before that.

“I’ve got so much respect for how hard he plays and all the different ways he helps the team in terms of the energy, the competitive fire, the do whatever it takes to win a game,” Hurley added. “I’m very grateful to coach him because he’s a winner and he’s a champion. But it’s a stressful relationship because you’re on him about decision making, and he’s gotta make so many decisions during the gam, maybe 80 percent of them are really good and 20 percent of them aren’t good. Your relationship kind of tilts back and forth between praising him and ripping him.”

Although it will likely find itself inside the Top 10 on Monday when the new polls are released, UConn is still a raw product in a sense, not without its warts. And with two road trips—to Villanova and a resurgent Georgetown—on deck in the coming days, the Huskies are content with not being the juggernaut they were a year ago. To Hurley, the lesser dominance is not as important as the ability to continue to come out on top by any means necessary.

“This team, it has its issues,” he reiterated. “For us, we’re doing anything we can to support our team to find ways to win games. It’s not as dominating and it’s not as highlight film, and it’s not as much a coronation, but at the end of the day, we’re one game behind where we were last year and we’re one game in the league ahead of where we were last year after everything that’s gone on in our season. So I’m really proud of the team, proud that they found a way to dig that game out today, and we gotta address our issues.”