R.J. Cole scored 25 points and Adama Sanogo had 10 points and eight rebounds as No. 20 UConn held off cold-shooting DePaul 57-50 for its fifth consecutive victory Saturday evening in Chicago.
Andre Jackson had 13 rebounds for the Huskies (15-4, 6-2 Big East Conference), who limited DePaul to 28.8 percent shooting from the field.
Javan Johnson scored 18 points and Brandon Johnson 14 for DePaul (10-10, 1-9), which lost its fourth straight game. DePaul played its fourth consecutive game without leading scorer Javon Freeman-Liberty (21.1 points a game), still out with a groin injury suffered on Jan. 13.
The Huskies scored as time expired in the first half, and they seemed to carry that momentum into the second half.
The first three baskets of the second half were scored by Sanogo, who had the buzzer-beater to close the first half.
Sanogo’s second-half baskets gave the Huskies a 34-29 advantage, and UConn extended its lead to 44-34 on Jalen Gaffney’s 3-point play with 11:42 left. Gaffney faked a 3-pointer, drove for a layup and was fouled.
But UConn’s poor shooting kept it from putting DePaul away until late in the game. Cole’s pull-up jumper with 45 seconds to go gave the Huskies a 55-47 lead.
UConn scored the first seven points of the game, and DePaul coach Tony Stubblefield quickly called a timeout with 17:40 to play in the first half. But after putting up seven points in a span of only 2:20, the Huskies didn’t manage another basket until Tyrese Martin scored in the paint with 10:46 left to cut UConn’s deficit to 13-11.
Brandon Johnson then scored six points in a 10-2 run that gave the Blue Demons a 23-13 advantage.
But Cole scored seven of the next eight points, including a back-door cut for a basket on a feed from Isaiah Whaley. DePaul led 23-21 after Cole’s near one-man scoring run but extend its lead back to four.
However, the Huskies scored the final basket of the half on a long inbound pass from Jackson to Sanogo, who got behind the DePaul defense and made and uncontested bank shot in the lane as time expired, leaving the Blue Demons with a 29-28 lead.
UConn scored despite having only nine-tenths of a second to work with after a DePaul shot-clock violation.
–Field Level Media
