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Dom Amore’s Sunday Read: Now’s time for this UConn senior to lead; Dan Hurley’s reading list and more
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- Dom Amore’s Sunday Read: Now’s time for this UConn senior to lead; Dan Hurley’s reading list and more
STORRS — So now there is one.
The five incoming freshman who posed in 2023 for a picture mirroring the famous Michigan Fab Five of long ago have made their marks, to one degree or another, on UConn men's basketball. And one by one they have moved on. Stephon Castle, the five-star recruit, lived up to all the hype, won a championship and was not only a "one-and-done," but he has had a torrid two seasons in the NBA in what would have been his second and third years in college. Youssouf Singare, the 7-footer, never broke through into the rotation and hit the transfer portal, surfacing at High Point, his former teammates at UConn watching him play in the NCAA Tournament last March and rooting hard for him.
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Jaylin Stewart gave UConn three solid seasons, then moved on via the portal last spring to SMU. Solo Ball, after playing through injury and pain all season, made the decision to get surgery on his wrist and, pending NCAA rules changes, will redshirt in 2026-27 and return next year.
As the season nears, that leaves Jayden Ross still standing, and on the verge of thriving and leading, to carry the banner for his classmates on the court as a UConn senior.
"You know, it is kind of crazy when I look back at it," Ross says. "I always tell people, whoa, I've been here three years, nobody's on the floor with me from that first year, or even that second year. The coaching staff does such a great job of bringing in guys who fit the culture of being in the gym every day and working, it's kind of easy to mold a team to where we need to be. So even though it's a lot of new faces, on the court it still feels familiar."
UConn men's notes: Jayden Ross leads defensive effort to stifle UCLA in Round of 32
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As in an old movie's transition, the pages of the calendar peel off and float away, and so do college teammates. Tristen Newton and Joey Calcaterra and Cam Spencer and Donovan Clingan and Samson Johnson and Tarris Reed Jr. and Liam McNeeley. It once seemed as if Alex Karaban would just stop the hands of time and play for UConn forever, but even he has moved on now to the pros.
Jayden Ross, who played sparingly as a freshmen on the 2023-24 championship team, a little more as a sophomore on the UConn team that made it as far as the Round of 32, and then far more, and far more meaningful minutes last season on the road to another Final Four, is still here. He's the latest embodiment of coach Dan Hurley's belief in player retention and development.
"He's had maybe the best summer of anybody," Hurley said. "He's just has got the confidence that he picked up last year from what he was able to do throughout the year, in some of the high-impact games and the NCAA Tournament games, making threes, defense, his ability to make plays on the court. He's had a great summer, he's been our best player a lot."
His younger brother, Jacob, joined him at UConn last season and is following the same course, playing little as a freshman, but developing, ever developing behind the scenes at the Werth Center. "… We all just pour confidence into each other," Jayden said.
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Ross, 6 feet 7, from Bristow, Va., and Long Island Lutheran's well-regarded program, has always brought a burst of energy into the games, crisp passing and cutting, dogged defense. Consistency in production has been the issue. Last season, playing 20 or so minutes a game, he scored 10 in the tight win over BYU, 13 in the Big East opener against Butler, 20 in two games against Xavier. In the NCAA Tournament, 11 in the second round against UCLA, with some clutch baskets down the stretch.
Maybe the final numbers, 17 1/2 minutes, 4.6 points, 2.5 rebounds, were still modest, but to the eyeball test Ross developed a knack for the big play or the big shot in big games.
"It all comes down to confidence, man, when you shoot as much as you do at this level you can't let the intensity of the game affect your shot," Ross said. "And I think I've gotten a lot better at that, a lot more confident in shooting my shot in games the way I want to shoot it."
Ross' size and stick-out athletic ability, in the mold of former Husky Andre Jackson , could make him a sneaky NBA Draft hopeful, "if it hits right, Hurley said, "or one of those guys who, worst-case scenario, is in the draft process to the bitter end." As a senior, Ross wants to be more show more than just athletic ability on the court.
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"I'm going to continue to do my best to show people I've got some game to me," he said. "There's a reason the coaching staff brought me here outside of athleticism, I can bring more than just that. If that's the main part of my game and that's what going to help this team win games and win a national championship, I'm going to do that, but I am going to bring my full game this year."
Ross is also taking the leadership piece seriously, as his embarks on his fourth year with Hurley. He wants to become an extension of the coaches when he's on the court.
"I think we're getting there," Ross said. "I think by the time the season starts he will have more trust in me on the court. My goal is to gain a lot of his trust during this preseason and hopefully by the season he'll kind of trust me to be an extension of the coaches, kind of like Alex was. … I'm a senior this year, so I don't want to have any regrets, man. I just want to have as much fun as I can with this team and just spread as much love and positivity as I can."
When he looks around the court now, Jayden Ross sees mostly new faces around him. Then he looks back and sees the enthusiastic, but unsure freshman he once was. Finally, he looks inward and reflects on the ways these eventful years at UConn have changed him, brought the best out of him.
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"You never know what God has in store for you," Ross said, "and it's been a blessing to have coach Hurley take me under his wing the last couple of years and the rest of the coaching staff, just to be able to learn so much. You think of all these different scenarios that can happen and I'm really glad it's played out this way to this point and I've got to enjoy my college experience here at UConn, go through the ups and downs, the wins and the heartbreaks and everything, man. I feel I've grown as a person, made a lot of friends, just to be able to be in this position now and also kind of look back to my freshman season and see what I was now and where I am now, it's truly a blessing to see how much I've been able to grow."
The rules keep changing and evolving, too. If the NCAA is able to implement its plan to offer five years of eligibility in five years, Ross have the option of coming back.
"This is obviously home to me," he said. "You can't get enough of a culture like this. When you're in a place like this you can feel yourself evolving and growing as a person and that feeling is really addictive. So it's definitely a possibility."
Dom Amore's Sunday Read: Brothers savor chance to play together at UConn; WNBA's farce and more
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More for your Sunday Read
Sunday short takes
*Another UConn men's transfer to keep an eye on is German-born senior Nils Machowski, transfer from Wofford and a versatile guard. "Nils is going to be an impact player," Hurley said. "Obviously there are adjustments he has to make in learning a new system, but he is a veteran. He is a talented guy. There is some Joey (Calcaterra) there. There is some Cam Spencer there."
*Wonder what the ghost of Shoeless Joe Jackson would say if he walked through the cornfield during last week's Field of Dreams gimmick game and saw the ads for sports betting sites on the outfield walls..
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*Fell down a retrosheet.org rabbit hole this week and discovered Babe Ruth allowed only 10 home runs in 1,221 innings pitched in the major leagues. This exclusive club has some historic names, including Sam Rice, a Hall of Famer, Buck Weaver, later banned in connection with the 1919 World Series scandal, Ray Chapman, later killed by a pitch and Steve O'Neill, who went on to manage the Tigers to the 1945 championship. Fritz Maisel is the only Yankee to homer off Ruth (in 1914), Frank Welch (1921) hit the only homer Ruth allowed as a Yankee. Tilly Walker and George Burns (not the comedian) each got the Babe twice; both later played with him. … Well, at least I found it interesting.
*A tale of what was, and can be again: Former Heisman Trophy winner and NFL star Robert Griffin III doubled down on a podcast on his long-held contention that the loudest college stadium he ever played in was Rentschler Field, when Baylor came to play UConn. "The sideline (seats) was like two feet from the dang field," Griffin told the Jack Mac football pod. "When that sideline was that close, and they got some liquor in 'em and that team was great, it was by far one of the loudest stadiums I ever played in."
*Count me among the old schoolers who see Hall-of-Fame inductions as formal, dignified ceremonies, a moment for humility and gratitude with maybe a self-deprecating joke or two in the spirit of Bob Uecker. So I found Adam Vinatieri's speech in Canton last week in poor taste, and I'm glad he later acknowledged that. Nothing malicious in his intent, but it was just the wrong tone for the occasion. It wasn't a Dean Martin Roast and the former Patriots and Colts kicker proved he is no Don Rickles … let alone Red Buttons.
*Stafford's Josh Simpson, the lefty reliever, is back in the big leagues with Seattle, but didn't get into a game against the Yankees in New York. While at Columbia, Simpson did appear in an Ivy League game with the Yankees' Ben Rice, a freshman at Dartmouth on March 30, 2019, but they did not face each other.
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*Hockey parents take note, Black Bear Hockey Foundation has opened its scholarship application window for players 18 and under. Go to Blackbearsportsgroup.com for more details.
Summer Reading
The Sunday Read consulted former high school history teacher Dan Hurley for some recommendations. " The Way of Excellence: A Guide to True Greatness and Deep Satisfaction in a Chaotic World" by Brad Stulberg was Mr. Hurley's reading assignment for players this summer. His own good reads have centered on America's 250th birthday, Ron Chernow's Pulitzer Prize biography of George Washington , David McCullough's "1776" and the Bill O'Reilly/Martin Dugard work "Killing England: The Brutal Struggle for American Independence" … Can find them all on Amazon, or better yet, support your nearest independent brick-and-mortar bookseller.
Last word
Very few sportswriters can truly say they helped made a difference in the way sports are covered. Our state sports journalism community lost such a consequential colleague last week. Carl Adamec, who wrote about local Connecticut sports since the early 1980s, started covering UConn women's basketball as a full-time beat for the Journal-Inquirer at the dawn of Geno Auriemma's tenure, long before most others. He became a virtual walking encyclopedia of the sport, the quintessential beat reporter, a go-to guy for all of us, and he was still writing about women's basketball for the Hearst papers when he died at 68. So the difference Carl made in Connecticut outlives the man, himself; we will miss him, and so will the countless readers of his work.
