Quentin Hillsman knows Connecticut is one of the best teams in the country.

He knows he’ll get a heavy bout of Breanna Stewart, Stefanie Dolson and Kelly Faris, and will have to find a remedy.

But for Hillsman, despite the fact Syracuse lost to UConn by 41 points last year, and 35 the year before, his approach doesn’t change. The teams have identical records this season, but Syracuse comes into the game as the clear underdog. Kayla Alexander, Rachel Coffey and Elashier Hall look to lead Syracuse (15-1, 3-0 Big East) to a big-time win over No. 3 Connecticut (15-1, 3-1 Big East) at 4 p.m. Saturday at the XL Center in Hartford, Conn.

“It’s a great opportunity,” said Hillsman, SU’s head coach. “Obviously we’re going down to Connecticut against a team that has been one of the top three programs in the country for as long as I’ve been in women’s basketball and been associated with it.”

In Hillsman’s stretch at Syracuse, his team has been up and down against UConn. In 2008, Syracuse lost to the Huskies by only six points in front of 4,221 fans, the largest crowd in SU women’s basketball history.

The very next year, though, Syracuse lost 107-54. His team has been in close games against the Huskies, and UConn have blown out the Orange.

This year, Hillsman said his players frequently beg him to let them keep scrimmaging in practice, even if the score is lopsided. He said the scrimmages are often down to the wire or a blowout – never in the middle.

“It’s never a 14-point win,” Hillsman said. “It’s either a 25- or 30-point win or it’s a very tight game. So we’ve been on both ends of this in practice. I think our team keeps fighting.”

That mentality of wanting to stay and get back in the game may be a useful tool Saturday.

Syracuse could face a deficit, as it did against DePaul, and might need to crawl its way out and embark on a run of its own to come away with a win.

For Alexander, in her last chance to beat UConn in the regular season, she’s ready to do everything she can to help her team get the win. After getting over the hump against Georgetown with an 86-56 win Saturday, she’ll look to do the same against the Huskies.

This mountain, though, is a lot steeper, but she said she’s ready for the challenge.

“It’s UConn and it’s Big East,” Alexander said. “To me every game gets me hyped, and it’s fun to play at this level. Big East play is really competitive.”

It was certainly competitive Tuesday night when Syracuse barely pulled out a win against a scrappy, energetic DePaul team.

After almost being ranked in The Associated Press Top 25 Poll, and with a juicy date with Connecticut this weekend, Syracuse could’ve fallen victim to a trap game Tuesday.

But Coffey dismissed that notion. She said Syracuse is on a mission, and is using a one-game-at-a-time mentality to get to where it wants to end up: in the NCAA Tournament.

“(DePaul’s) a really tough team,” Coffey said. “It could have been a trap game, but we’re really not looking at that. We’re going into each game looking to win them all. Whether we’re playing UConn or we’re playing Seton Hall, we just want to go into each game and win it.”

Syracuse’s hot start to the season flaunted its balance, talent and athletic ability. But the Orange will face its biggest test yet on Saturday.

Like Alexander, Coffey said the team has to look at the matchup as just another game, instead of getting wide-eyed and overly eager at the opportunity to take down the country’s No. 3 team. Just because it’s the rivals’ final Big East regular-season meeting, it doesn’t change Syracuse’s approach.

Coffey does acknowledge, though, that the Orange will have to exert even more effort than it does on a regular basis.

“UConn is UConn. You’ve got to go into the game knowing it’s UConn,” Coffey said. “We’ve just got to keep doing what we’re doing, playing hard – play them like any other team. We have to play 10 times harder than we would against other teams.”

Published on January 17, 2013 at 12:50 am

Contact Trevor: tbhass@syr.edu | @TrevorHass