ROSARIO HAS BIG TARGET ON HIS BACK

Rutgers freshman Rosario romped in Gampel debut


By Zach Smart



Storrs—It was a rude awakening for highly-touted freshman Mike Rosario at UConn last night.

The Huskies’ trio of Jerome Dyson, Stanley “Sticks” Robinson, and Craig Austrie negated the scoring machine that eclipsed Samuerdo Samuels as the top freshman scorer in the Big East.

Dyson hounded, harassed, and hurled Rosario into the worst shooting night of his young collegiate career. The 6-foot-3 neophyte from Jersey City shot an arctic 2-for-13 from the field, finishing with just 10 points.

While he drew fouls and sank 5-of-6 from the charity stripe, Rosario hit nothing but iron during the first half, going 0-for-8 before an announced crowd of 10,167 at the Gampel Pavilion.

Rosario, who hit up North Carolina for 26 and hung 22 on Jamie Dixon and Pittsburgh, watched his hot-streak quickly falter as he met a team dripping with height, long arms and athletic wings in UConn.

So, he wrapped up his three-game stiff competition test with an average of 19.3 points.

Not bad for a callow freshman but Rosario’s got to watch out for those older, wiser, big dog gamers.

On a night when the Huskies were thirsting to come back with a vengeance in the worst way imaginable (they were outplayed by Georgetown in Monday’s lost and got a classic Jim Calhoun earful for their listless performance), they put a straightjacket on Rutgers.

The Scarlet Knights looked as if they were handcuffed in the jungle at midnight, shooting a paltry 6-foot-23 in the first half. The confines of the perimeter weren’t much more comfortable for Rosario.

The kid that rained threes on bottom-tier teams such as Robert Morris and NJIT (though he hit 4-for-8 from beyond the arc against UNC), shot just 1-for-6 from three-point territory.

“All great players go through games like that,” said Rutgers head coach Fred Hill, who knows how important a productive Rosatio is to the Knight's college basketball odds of winning.

“In the second half when you're grinding it and you're not making shots, I think you mentally get worn down. I think in the second half the end of the week got to us mentally more than I would have liked, but you've got to give UConn the credit for being so physical and so tough."

While Austrie did a good job denying and Robinson used his freakish athleticism and aggression to keep Rosario at bay, Dyson deserves most of the credit for the negating job he did.

“We were able to get stops,” explained Dyson. “Defense is what drives us.”

Rosario tried to get himself free, but was cut off. The long arms were in his face all night, making it difficult for him to get some good shots off. Shooting over opponents that stand 6-feet-7 is much more difficult than Rosario’s workaday matchup.