Napier question's team's heart

HARTFORD — Following the Boston Celtics' 33-point loss to the Los Angeles Lakers in Game 3 of the 1984 NBA Finals, Larry Bird said the team played like a bunch of "sissies." He added that to fix things, the team would need 12 heart transplants. Boston would go on to win the series in seven.

On Saturday, after the UConn men's basketball team's 79-64 loss to Marquette at the XL Center's season finale put the Huskies' NCAA tournament hopes on the bubble, sophomore guard Shabazz Napier, a Boston native, questioned his teammates' heart. The jury is still out as to whether Napier's ploy will work, but the team captain is hoping he could light a fire under his teammates for the home stretch.

"At the end of the game, I told the guys, ‘I've got to questions a lot of your guys' hearts,'" Napier said. "We're not giving it all. I've made mistakes. At the same time, I learn from my mistakes, I make sure I apologize for my mistakes and I told the guys, ‘I'm not perfect.' The only reason I'm speaking out is because I'm the captain. At the end of the day, I'm the only one who wants to speak out. Everybody else wants to stay in the locker room and be quiet like we just died."

Napier questioned his team's pride, toughness and ability to give it back to a team when they are taking it to you.

"Some guys don't want to give it back, some guys get punched and want to throw a pillow at somebody," Napier said. "This is basketball, you're supposed to go out and give it your all. This is team basketball, it's not tennis, it's not golf."

He was also concerned with UConn's willingness to give the Golden Eagles uncontested lay-ups and alley-oop attempts at the end of game.

"It doesn't look like UConn basketball," Napier said. "It doesn't look like basketball at all. Where I'm from, you're not getting an alley-oop at the end of the game... It looked like we gave up at the end ... For those words to be coming out of my mouth, it's outrageous."

Napier pointed out that he told the same thing to his teammates in the locker room, before speaking to the media.

"I say it to them all the time," Napier said. "I'm blunt. I tell the guys all the time, what I feel, but sometimes I hold a lot back in."

Napier said he doesn't understand why his teammates' take his comments directed towards them so personal, when they don't do the same for coach Jim Calhoun. He said he's spoken with Tyler Olander, calling him a great player, but saying he needs to be less timid and shoot more. He said Ryan Boatright's technical that halted the Husky rally was ‘immature' and that the freshman guard and Andre Drummond need to realize that the referees will only see retaliation. Napier reiterated that he still believes this is a good team and that he'd go into any battle with his teammates and be 100 percent behind them.

It was Marquette who won the battle in Hartford on Saturday, with Jae Crowder and Darius Johnson-Odom leading the way. Crowder finished with 29 points and 12 rebounds while Johnson-Odom scored 24 points.

"You can't measure heart and in a world where we try to count everything, not everything counts," said Marquette coach Buzz Williams.