It's about 45 minutes until the Huskies take the court to face Wisconsin - Green Bay. I like the Phoenix. They ahve a swagger to them and a chip on their shoulder, as well. That seems a bit of a contradiction because teams with swager are confident while teams playing with a chip feel they have something to prove. That said, I see how both a possible. You'd have to be a team on the rise. You know, like the Phoenix.

UWGB has the longest winning streak in the nation. None of their wins came against particularly good teams. They have three common oppoents with UConn: Oakland, Marquette and DePaul. The Huskies went 3-0 with two games coming at home. UWGB lost two, to DePaul (home) and Marquette (away) by a combined five points. They beat Oakland by 22. All of those games came in November. Other opponents of any interest are Minnesota, Kansas State and Iowa. They won all but K-State.

The trouble UConn presents for the Phoenix isn't that UWGB is a bad offensive team. They aren't. They are surprisingly good. Coming out of the Horizon League, I would subtract about 10 points per game as a means of adjusting their production as if they were in a major conference with a tougher schedule. They are 50th in RPI, UConn is 3rd.

The Phoeniz are in the Top 10 in eight team cataegories, including tops in free throw percentage and 3rd in turnovers per game.

Anyway, UWGB averages better than 77 points per game. For the sake of adjustment, I put them at 67, seven points and change behind UConn. But as I was saying, the real challenge comes on defense. UWGB allows 60.6 points per game, but allowed over 70 to Kansas State, DePaul, Loyola, Detroit, UW-Milwaukee (twice) and Butler. I think they are in trouble against the Huskies.