UConn's Okafor Healthy and Ready to Play

<br> <br>BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) _ Connecticut's Emeka Okafor stretched his long legs, breezed through a light practice and smiled. <br><br>The Huskies' No. 50 is ready to show everyone how healthy

Thursday, March 18th 2004, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) _ Connecticut's Emeka Okafor stretched his long legs, breezed through a light practice and smiled.

The Huskies' No. 50 is ready to show everyone how healthy he is.

``It's been an up-and-down season _ it wasn't fun,'' said Okafor, who leads the nation with 20 double-doubles and 4.5 blocks per game despite back problems all season.

``Everybody talks about the last week, but we won eight of the last nine, so we're pretty consistent right now, and we plan to do it for six more games.''

The Huskies are coming off a scintillating 61-58 victory over Pittsburgh in the Big East title game, their third straight win after a disappointing road loss to defending national champion Syracuse that prevented UConn from sharing the Big East regular-season title with the Panthers.

Okafor, clearly bothered by his back, attempted only two shots against the Orangemen, then sat out the first two games of the Big East tournament while Ben Gordon took charge.

To head coach Jim Calhoun, that was a turning point for the Huskies, who were picked to win the national championship in the preseason but struggled through a 5-4 stretch at midseason.

``I like the way our team is playing. I like the fact that the only time we weren't able to win was when Emeka was incapacitated,'' said Calhoun, who guided UConn to the national championship five years ago. ``This is the opportunity, the time of year when the kids, the team can do something really, really special. I think they can. I just hope they believe they can.''

``We can build off how we played our last three games and not let it go to our heads,'' said Gordon, the MVP of the Big East tournament. ``It was important that I played that way. It was more important that we won the games. The season's not over yet. We've got a long way to go.''

Connecticut (27-6), the second seed in the Phoenix Regional, faces No. 15 Vermont (22-8), and seventh-seeded DePaul (21-9) plays Dayton (24-8) in first-round games Thursday. The Buffalo subregional also features Saint Joseph's (27-1), the top seed in the East Rutherford Regional, against No. 16 Liberty (18-14), and eighth-seeded Texas Tech (22-10) against No. 9 Charlotte (21-8).

Despite the imposing odds, the Catamounts aren't exactly ready to give in just yet _ they're actually enjoying themselves. Although it took them nine hours to get from Burlington to Buffalo on Tuesday, a trip that should have taken less than two hours, at least they managed to practice and speak their minds.

Last year, they were stranded overnight in the Denver airport by a snowstorm on the way to a first-round matchup with Arizona and arrived in Salt Lake City just 13 hours before losing 80-51.

``We're going to really benefit from the ambiance,'' head coach Tom Brennan said. ``We're here and we're part of it. Last year, we just had stars in our eyes. We just wanted to go to the mildest place and play late.

``This year, these guys really think they have a chance to win a game,'' he said. ``They really think they're good, and they have every right to think that. ``

The Catamounts think that way because they have players such as two-time America East player of the year Taylor Coppenrath. He had 43 points and 13 rebounds in the conference championship game after missing a month with a broken wrist.

``Forty-three is a lot of points. We have great respect for what they can do,'' Calhoun said. ``He's a special player. He'll be a terrific test.''

The Huskies love to run. The Catamounts just hope they can keep up.

``They play so up-tempo. They're probably the best transition team in the country,'' Vermont guard David Hehn said. ``They usually have two guys down the floor before the other team gets there. They're very, very tough to stop. We're just going to try and have guys back after every shot.''

Texas Tech coach Bob Knight returns to Buffalo for the first time since a loss to Pepperdine in the 2000 tournament, his final game at Indiana. Knight was fired five months later, took a year off, then took the job with the Red Raiders.

In his 29 years at Indiana, Knight led the Hoosiers to 24 tournament appearances, including 15 straight between 1986 and 2000, and won national championships in 1976, `81 and `87.

Despite the successes, Knight has lost in the first round in five of his last seven trips to the NCAAs and hasn't been to the round of 16 since 1994.

``We hear all that stuff,'' senior swingman Mikey Marshall said. ``Hopefully, we can change that history, but that doesn't have anything to do with us. We're just trying to make it past the first round.''