Solo Ball scored a career-high 26 points on 8-of-14 shooting to lead UConn to a 79-60 victory over Butler in Hartford, Conn. on Tuesday night to open Big East conference play.
Tarris Reed Jr. added 16 points and five rebounds for UConn (11-1, 1-0). Silas Demary Jr. dished out 11 assists.
Drayton Jones led Butler (8-3, 1-1) with 13 points. Azavier Robinson and Evan Haywood each added 10. It was a season-low in scoring for a team that averaged over 90 points per game coming in.
Butler’s scoring leaders in Finley Bizjack (18.8 per game) and Michael Ajayi (17.4 per game) each had tough nights. Bizjack had seven points on 2-for-9 shooting while Ajayi had eight on 3-for-12 shooting.
Butler came out strong as the Bulldogs took advantage of sloppy play from UConn and held an 11-4 edge at the first media timeout.
Whatever Huskies coach Dan Hurley said in that timeout worked, as UConn controlled the rest of the half from there. The Huskies immediately went on a 14-3 run and went into halftime up 39-25.
Ball had 17 of his points at the break while Reed had 10. Butler’s 25 first-half points were a season-low behind a 1-for-12 3-point performance.
The offense failed to improve for the Bulldogs early in the second as they started the half missing their first 11 shot attempts.
Jayden Ross shined for UConn in the second half. He scored 13 points in the half alone including multiple highlight-reel dunks to keep their lead in the double-digits despite multiple short runs from Butler.
The Huskies remain undefeated all-time against their conference foe, improving to 12-0 with all 12 matchups taking place since 2011.
–Field Level Media
