Huskies looking for payback

Jeff Adrien hasn't beaten Villanova since his freshman year.

Now a senior captain, Adrien readily admits that the Wildcats are a team he circles on his calendar every year.

"We owe them," Adrien said. "They've beaten us the last two years, they always play us tough. We've got to come out and play even tougher."

Adrien and the No. 3-ranked Huskies (16-1, 5-1 Big East) will get their chance for redemption tonight when they welcome No. 21 Villanova (14-3, 2-2) to the XL Center at 7 p.m. (ESPN).

In order to reverse its fortune against the conference rival, UConn will need to do what it hasn't in the past two seasons - get the ball out of Scottie Reynolds' hands.

Reynolds, a 6-foot-1 junior guard, hung 41 points on the Huskies at Gampel Pavilion two years ago in a 89-75 'Nova victory and scored a team-high 18 points when the Wildcats upended UConn, 67-65, a year ago.

"Scottie Reynolds isn't real fast, he doesn't jump particularly well," said UConn assistant coach George Blaney. "But he uses his body better than anyone in college basketball. Our main focus is just staying in front of him."

Senior guard A.J. Price, who defended Reynolds in his 41-point outburst, doesn't want to let the past bother him.

"That game was two years ago," Price said. "We're a different team now and so are they."

And that is the scary part. Through Reynolds' first two collegiate seasons, Villanova basically went as far as he could carry them. This year, however, the Wildcats have a few more weapons at their disposal. Sophomore guards Corey Stokes and Corey Fisher have come into their own after disappointing freshman campaigns. Fisher is averaging 10 points and 2.9 assists per game and the 6-foot-5 Stokes is scoring 9.9 points per contest while converting 44.7 percent of his 3-point attempts.

Senior forward Dante Cunningham, who averaged just 2.2 points per game and shot 39 percent from the free throw line as a freshman, has suddenly developed into the Wildcats leading scorer. The 6-foot-8, 230-pound Cunningham is averaging 17.4 points per game, which ranks eighth in the Big East, to go along with 7.4 rebounds per game. He is shooting 54 percent from the field and has improved his free throw percentage to 72 percent.

"Because of Cunningham's ability to go out to the mid-range and even a little beyond that, it changes [Villanova] a little bit from years past," Blaney said. "They're a good offensive team, [Jay Wright] is a very good offensive coach and they keep you spread. I think that's the hardest thing, your help is not as easy to come [by] because most of the time they play four out, one in and that's always the most difficult thing to defend."

Sunday's 76-61 victory over Seton Hall, a guard-oriented team that plays a similar style to Villanova, helped the Huskies prepare for the game tonight. Junior guard Jerome Dyson, who limited Seton Hall's Jeremy Hazell (22.3 points per game) to just five points in the first half, has the difficult task of locking down Reynolds tonight.

"The players that I'm guarding every night are capable of going for big numbers," Dyson said. "That's what Scottie's trying to do and I just have to make sure to keep the ball out of his hands."

Offensively, UConn will try to exploit the tremendous size advantage it possesses over Villanova. The entire starting frontcourt - Adrien, Hasheem Thabeet and Stanley Robinson - are taller than Cunningham, a natural small forward/power forward who plays center for the Wildcats. Adrien is intent on being physical on the inside from the get-go and crashing the boards hard on both sides (UConn has won the rebounding battle in each of its 17 games thus far).

"If you look at their frontcourt, they're pretty thin," Adrien said. "If we can get them in foul trouble, I think we can give them fits … I don't think they have an answer for Stanley Robinson really."

Kevin.R.Duffy@UConn.edu