Dom Amore: Tap the brakes on March Madness, UConn men dealing with a January crisis of confidence

So here we thought words like “embarrassing” and “outtoughed” were a thing of the past for the UConn men’s basketball team. The Huskies, after 14 games, were lost in a giddy world of analytics and win probabilities and their nation of followers was preoccupied with the AP poll.

But KenPom ratings and AP rankings can’t predict what a team will look like when the heat is turned up on a night like Wednesday, in a place like Providence. Conference road games rattle and trip up even the best teams, and UConn did not look like the No. 1 or 2 or 4 team in the nation, but rather the second best team on the floor in the Amica Mutual Pavilion.

Quite frankly, the Friars were more tenacious and UConn was not ready for it.