Despite near disasters, UConn finds a way to win

	UConn's bench was left celebrating after Rashad Anderson saved the Huskies once again. Travis Lindquist/Getty Images

WASHINGTON -- As Rashad Anderson came to the bench, assistant coach Tom Moore kissed him on the back of the head. Backup big man Ed Nelson stood off to the side, shaking his head with a look of amused amazement. Josh Boone took a long, deep breath and exhaled.

And this was before the start of overtime.

Connecticut had tempted fate for so long and so late into its Sweet 16 game against fifth-seeded Washington that even the Connecticut players could hardly believe they were getting a second life. They'd bumbled their way through the game's first 26 minutes, trailed by as many as 11, briefly reclaimed the lead, then fallen back behind again by six in the final 1:16 before Anderson's pair of 3-pointers -- the last with 1.8 seconds remaining -- averted disaster.

By halfway into overtime, nearly the entire Washington starting lineup had fouled out, and it seemed Connecticut would finally be able to cruise.

Not before one more potential crisis.

After Ryan Appleby's 3-pointer with 16.3 seconds left cut the deficit to two, Rudy Gay threw the ensuing in-bound pass right to Appleby. The mouths of the entire Connecticut cheering section went agape. And then, just like that, Marcus Williams had stepped in front of Washington star Brandon Roy to steal it back, draw the foul and, finally, ensure a 98-92 victory for his team -- really.

Such is life these days for the 2005-06 Connecticut Huskies, the seemingly ticking time-bomb that refuses to blow.

"It's so miraculous," head coach Jim Calhoun said after his top-seeded team's latest midnight (or in this case 1 a.m.) escape. "We made every possible bad play we could, even with Rudy's pass. ... It was the kind of stuff that has to happen to you to be able to move on."

What happened to Connecticut on Friday night was that it ran into a hellacious Washington defense that had them literally tripping over themselves for just over a half of basketball. Connecticut would commit a staggering 26 turnovers on the night, 22 of them in the game's first 25 minutes.

Washington defender Bobby Jones' pressure on the ball so frazzled normally unflappable UConn point guard Williams (he committed seven turnovers) that Calhoun repeatedly yanked him, and, during one particularly heated moment on the bench, lit into him. "Are you ready to start playing basketball?" he yelled at Williams before reinserting him. At one point late in the first half, a frustrated Calhoun inserted little-used backup Rob Garrison for a possession. "What other choice do I have?" he shouted to the bench.

Williams, however, was hardly the only one having problems with Washington's defense. Gay struggled mightily in the first half, missing all four of his shots. Anderson couldn't get open looks.

"No team," said Calhoun, "has disrupted us on offense as much as Washington did."