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Weekend Brunch: Why UConn’s Donovan Clingan is primed to be one of college basketball’s most dominant players

Dan Hurley likes losing about as much as a normal person likes bumper-to-bumper traffic on the Long Island Expressway.

If Hurley isn’t winning, he’s miserable.

And sometimes when he’s winning, he’s still miserable.

But when UConn lost to Marquette by six points on Jan. 11th in Milwaukee, the coach who three months later would lead the Huskies to the national title knew that there was a silver lining to the defeat.

That was the night where 7-3 freshman Donovan Clingan tallied the first 20-point, 10-rebound performance of his career against power conference competition. Clingan — who backed up NCAA Tournament MOP Adama Sanogo last season — also added five blocks in 21 minutes.

“They didn’t have a matchup for him,” Hurley said of Clingan following his performance in Milwaukee.

Expect the rest of college basketball to echo the same sentiment next season.

With Sanogo no longer a part of UConn’s program, the door is open for Clingan — who averaged 5.8 points, five rebounds, and 1.8 blocks in just 12.2 minutes during six NCAA Tournament games — to become one of the sport’s dominant stars during the 2023-24 season.

Think about this: If Clingan’s minutes were doubled during the NCAA Tournament as a starter, he would have been on track to average 11.6 points, 10 rebounds, and 3.6 blocks in 24.4 minutes. By comparison, Anthony Davis averaged 14.2 points, 10.4 rebounds, and 4.7 blocks in 32 minutes when he led Kentucky to the 2012 national title as a freshman.

Clingan averaged 16 points, 11.5 rebounds, and 4.5 blocks last season in the two games that he logged 20 minutes or more. He’s fully expected to be a Preseason All-American and Big East Player of the Year candidate next season.

UConn is currently ranked SEVENTH in the ROTHSTEIN 45.

On The Side

  • Duke’s Tyrese Proctor averaged 10.8 points and 5.4 assists in five postseason games last spring with an assist-to-turnover ratio of 27:5 during that span. The 6-5 Proctor should be one of the best guards in college basketball in 2023-24.
  • Ed Cooley said on this week’s College Hoops Today Podcast that Georgetown and Maryland are in discussions to start a home-and-home series, but it likely won’t begin until the 2024-25 season.
  • Only one of the Big 12’s Top 17 scorers from last season — LJ Cryer — will return in 2023-24. Cryer — who averaged 15 points a year ago at Baylor — has transferred to Houston, who joins the Big 12 this season.
  • Washington State’s top four scorers — TJ Bamba, Mouhamed Gueye, Justin Powell, and DJ Rodman — have all left the Cougars’ program following last season. Bamba and Rodman transferred to Villanova and USC respectively while Gueye and Powell are pursuing professional careers.
  • Former North Carolina commit Simeon Wilcher visited St. John’s on Thursday. The 6-4 guard is a consensus Top-50 prospect in the 2023 class.

Leftovers