The Associated Press

NEW YORK - Coach Jim Calhoun has no idea how Connecticut will respond after its shocking loss to Georgia Tech in the Preseason NIT semifinals.

He'll find out tonight, when the Huskies play Utah in the tournament's consolation game, an embarrassing place to be for the No. 1 team in the country.

"I don't know," Calhoun said after UConn lost to Georgia Tech 77-61 Wednesday. "We can get beat again or bounce back - and I assume we bounce back. But once again, I was deflated and I very rarely get deflated."

The result is top-ranked UConn plays in the warmup game, before Texas Tech meets Georgia Tech for the tournament championship.

Connecticut shot 37.9 percent, including 1-for-10 on 3-pointers. The trouble was further complicated by making just 10-of-30 free throws.

UConn was hampered because preseason All-American Emeka Okafor, limited by a bad back, managed just nine points and operated much of the game at half-speed with a bad back.

DAYTON: UD's seniors left Maui with the bigger trophy this time. Ramod Marshall, Sean Finn and Keith Waleskowski combined for all but 20 of the Flyers' points and Dayton (4-0) defeated Hawaii 82-72 late Wednesday in the championship game of the Maui Invitational.

The three seniors were freshmen on the UD team that finished third in this event in 2000.

Marshall was the outside threat and the 7-foot Finn and 6-8 Waleskowski took care of things down low as the Flyers rallied from a seven-point deficit with 11:18 to play.

"The three seniors really took the game over in the last 12 minutes," first-year Dayton coach Brian Gregory said.

Marshall finished with 27 points, while Finn had 18 and Waleskowski, the tournament MVP, had 17 points and nine rebounds.

"This is a big win for the program and it separates these kids from the others and that's important," Gregory said. "When you see the schools on that list who have won the tournament, and now Dayton will be on it forever."