The UConn men's basketball team looks for its first Big East win of the year as it welcomes Hall of Fame coach Rick Pitino and St. John's to Hartford on Saturday.

STORRS – The film session that followed the UConn men’s loss to Seton Hall in their Big East Conference opener was just as brutal as coach Dan Hurley had promised it would be.

The Huskies’ sixth-year head coach isn’t the type to bury the film. He wanted his players to see it to emphasize what they did on the court Wednesday night “took a wrecking ball to success.”

“They need to see the mistakes and just how bad it was because I don’t think that they know quite how bad it is until they’ve seen it. So we watched it and it was a brutal video session because it was a terrible performance. .. You’re not a program that wins at the level we’ve been winning at for the last 50 or so games if you just willy nilly move on from that game,” Hurley said.

“That performance was a stain for us.”

The page was turned on Friday as the team committed its attention to preparing for St. John’s – a primetime matchup in Hartford just before the holidays; a Hall of Fame coach in Rick Pitino coming in to try and spoil the Huskies’ home conference opener.

“We need the XL Center just rocking from the start. The XL can’t wait for us to start playing well, the XL’s got to be rocking from the anthem,” Hurley said. “We need a Phog Allen (Fieldhouse) type of atmosphere. Just the psyche of the group and whatever Donovan (Clingan)’s situation is, we’re just gonna need that crowd to feel like a big-time crowd.”

Donovan Clingan sprains ankle, UConn stunned in Big East opener at Seton Hall, 75-60

Clingan, who sprained his right ankle early in the second half against Seton Hall and did not return, did not practice Thursday or Friday. Wednesday’s injury is separate from his prior issues with the foot, he had an MRI Friday morning, and the team was still waiting for results following practice.

“He wanted to try to go back in the other night early and then it tightened up on him, so we’ll just see how he feels in the morning and wait to get the MRI bone scan,” Hurley said.

Protecting the other rim is Joel Soriano, one of the best centers in the nation and one of two Johnnies who Pitino kept on the roster from last year. The job of defending him — “an old, physical, double-double machine,” Hurley said — will likely take a group effort between Samson Johnson and forwards Alex Karaban and Jaylin Stewart, potentially Jayden Ross as well.

“(If Clingan is out) I think it changes how we are offensively and defensively. I think we see with Sam we’re a lot more aggressive on the defensive end,” Karaban said. “Donovan was battling a foot injury (before) the season, too, so we had time when he was out to get Youssouf (Singare) in and get Samson in to get them adjusted. So whether he plays or not, we’re ready.”

The rest of the St. John’s roster was almost hand-picked by Pitino, who took the job shortly after his Iona team was ousted by UConn in the first round of the NCAA Tournament last year.

“They have a very talented roster, an old team,” Hurley said. “We potentially, based on what Donovan’s doing, could potentially have three or four freshmen on the court (Friday) night, that’s obviously something that’s running through my mind.”

St. John’s (8-3) began its conference season with a 15-point win over Xavier on Wednesday. Soriano had 18 points, 14 rebounds, five assists and six blocks in that one while former UConn guard Nahiem Alleyne had 15 points of his own – the most he’s scored in a game this year. In addition to Soriano, St. John’s has three guards averaging double-digit scoring in Daniss Jenkins (Iona), Jordan Dingle (Penn) and Chris Ledlum (Harvard).

Pitino’s team has the No. 45 offense and the No. 68 defense in the country, per KenPom, and is one of the nation’s better teams defending the ball inside. The Johnnies allow their opponents to shoot 33.3% from beyond the 3-point line, which is tied for No. 214 in the nation.

“When you’re who we are right now, with all due respect, I don’t think that you’re looking at any game like it’s our Super Bowl,” Hurley said. “I know that’s how our opponents feel when they face us and we’ve got to get ourselves there. But every game is a huge game.”

Welcome back, Nahiem Alleyne

Alleyne, who spent one year at UConn and was one of the valuable bench weapons that helped the Huskies along their national championship run, will make his return to Hartford after joining Pitino at St. John’s weeks after cutting the nets in Houston.

“The crowd will give Nahiem what he deserves. He just was an incredible player for us and a soldier and a national champion and just was a total team guy,” Hurley said. “Sometimes you play against former players and there’s a little bit of a grudge feeling, not with this guy. Because he was such a critical part of doing what we did and it’s changed everyone’s life.”

Alleyne, who played his first three college seasons at Virginia Tech, averaged 5.2 points per game in 17.9 minutes for the Huskies last season and finds himself in a similar role, typically off the bench, at St. John’s. The fifth-year guard from Buford, Georgia, is averaging 7.6 points in 17.5 minutes per game and has gotten his 3-point percentage up to 36.1% after shooting a career-low 30.5% for the Huskies.

“It will be cool to see him in warmups and then after the game, talk to him just because he was so important to winning a national championship for us last year so it will definitely be cool to see him,” Karaban said, “but when the game starts he’s the opponent.”

What to know

Site: XL Center, Hartford

Time: 8 p.m.

Records: No. 5 UConn: 10-2 (0-1 Big East), St. John’s: 8-3 (1-0 Big East)

Series history: St. John’s leads, 37-31

Last meeting: Feb. 25, 2023 – UConn 95, St. John’s 86 at Madison Square Garden

TV: FOX – Gus Johnson, Jim Jackson

Radio: UConn Sports Network on 97.9 ESPN – Mike Crispino, Wayne Norman

Pregame reading:

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