UConn men's basketball begins life without Alex Karaban. It wasn't pretty: Mike Anthony

UNCASVILLE – Tuesday’s men’s basketball game, or whatever it was, between UConn and Syracuse at Mohegan Sun Arena was billed as an exhibition.

This is what it’s supposed to look like in mid-October, I guess: Two teams trading turnovers and fouls in a contest that, at least initially, deserved a first-to-11-wins distinction.

Eventually, UConn, a team in one sort of transition, defeated an opponent in another sort of transition, 72-52.

If this was UConn-Syracuse in January 2001, Jim Calhoun and Jim Boeheim would have went on about the beauty of a Big East rock fight and we’d all take strange pleasure in celebrating the mess that both teams created for one to survive.

Twenty-five years later, it was barely tolerable, aesthetically. The Huskies survived, not that the final score mattered. Important, though, was turning the page, symbolically and otherwise – and to just get this out of the way. Somewhere, Alex Karaban must have been wondering what the heck he was watching.

“I just thought about that as I was driving over here, just how bad it sucks to not have Alex,” Dan Hurley said a day earlier, after a practice in Hartford that preceded the drive down Route 2. “The thing with AK was, just his seriousness, his preparation, his leadership, just his consistency – no matter how you felt about your team, you knew you always had Mr. Reliable. It’s a different type of feel with this team.”

There’s point guard Silas Demary Jr., of course, the Big East preseason player of the year, last year’s starter on a team that reached the national championship game. There’s Braylon Mullins, the shooting guard who was the story of college basketball for the stretch heading into last season’s Final Four. There’s Jayden Ross, a senior like Demary, and a player who has waited and developed with patience. And there’s Solo Ball, in street clothes for now, maybe set to contribute later this season if recovery from wrist surgery allows.

UConn’s Nik Khamenia looks for an open teammate as Syracuse’s Francis Folefac defends during a Hall of Fame Exhibition Series preseason exhibition game at Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn., Tuesday, October 13, 2026. (Dave Zajac/Hearst Connecticut Media)

Those guys gathered at Mohegan with their new teammates and square off against an old UConn rival, with Syracuse now led by first-year coach Gerry McNamara, who famously broke top-ranked UConn’s heart in the 2006 Big East Tournament. The Orange are rebuilding – the team and the program. UConn has augmented yet again, another roster built with Final Four designs, key returning players joined by transfer portal additions and true freshman pegged for specific roles.

Gone are Karaban and Tarris Reed Jr., for example.

On board are Nik Khamenia and Na’jai Hines – two of the more active players as the Huskies’ built a slim first-half lead, and two stabilizing forces throughout.

Khamenia, from Duke, made two 3-pointers and Hines, from Seton Hall, had two dunks in the half. The game did, eventually, take on a palatable flow, largely thanks to these players. Hines had 17 points and eight rebounds in 20 minutes. He was a force. Khamenia added 12 points and eight rebounds in a team-high 30 minutes.

If all you’d take from UConn’s first time out on the court is that the key transfers – Khamenia from Duke and Hines from Seton Hall – looked like a great fit, well, you’d take it. UConn – like any and every team, to be fair – certainly has a lot of rust to knock off before it starts attacking one of the most challenging non-conference schedules in program history, but that doesn’t happen, in this day and age, without actually putting yourself out there a bit.

UConn’s Na’jai Hines controls underneath for the Huskies as Syracuse’s Luke Wilson defends during a Hall of Fame Exhibition Series preseason exhibition game at Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn., Tuesday, October 13, 2026. (Dave Zajac/Hearst Connecticut Media)

Tuesday’s game wasn’t there only as something to enjoy for paying fans whose money will be redirected to the growing expenses of college athletics. It was, for Hurley’s purpose, to use as a building block – a big, visible building block that made one yearn for what was on display in March 2026 and/or what should be in March 2027.

“I’m just excited to see kind of where we are – things we’ve got to scrap, things we’ve got to improve, things that are encouraging,” Hurley said heading into the game. “You just really want to get to some of these exhibitions so you can start learning some things about your team. You’re just tired of battering into each other. Go play and see what people look like.”

The sum of the parts wasn’t so pretty. That doesn’t mean many of the pieces looked like they didn’t fit. UConn had too many answers for Syracuse, as it should. And the post-Karaban era, early warts and all on display, got off to the rather ugly, certainly necessary, start that could have been predicted.