Andre Jackson's Albany homecoming is business trip for UConn men's basketball team: 'True captain'

ALBANY — As Andre Jackson’s mother, Tricia Altieri was able to quickly secure about a dozen tickets to the UConn men’s basketball team’s NCAA Tournament opener Friday against Iona.

That allotment will accommodate, oh, about 1/25^th of Jackson’s friends and family members expected to attend the game.

“There will be hundreds, honestly,” Altieri said Thursday as the Huskies held an open practice at MVP Arena. “This is all fun for me. The ticket part is over. That’s the worst part. People ask me and I say, ‘I’m so sorry, I don’t have any. So sorry, but here’s the app. Here’s StubHub.’”

Jackson, UConn’s junior captain, is from Amsterdam, about a half-hour drive from downtown Albany, where on Thursday his mother was joined at the arena by a couple dozen co-workers. They work just a few miles away.

“Trish, what’s your son’s name?” one woman asked.

“Andre,” Altieri said.

“Andre!” the woman yelled to the court, getting no immediate reaction.

“ANDRE!” she yelled, louder this time, and Jackson smiled his way through stretches and shooting drills during a light public workout.

UConn playing an NCAA Tournament game in Albany is like Jackson holding the most important business meeting of his life in his childhood living room, or in the driveway of his grandparent’s house where he first dunked a basketball.

Jackson played at Albany Academy before becoming the heart and soul of what Dan Hurley has built at UConn. No player’s value to a team has been micro-analyzed more Jackson’s and no player’s value to the program surpasses what Jackson has brought to the Huskies.

“The college game starts feeling like the G League sometimes, with players leaving and getting a better deal somewhere else,” Hurley said at a press conference that preceded practice. “Just grateful to be able to coach somebody that's a throwback, an old school. All he cares about is the team, doesn't care if he takes a shot, doesn't care about his NIL valuation.

“He's just a throwback, man, that only cares about UConn basketball. I don't want him to want it so bad [Friday] for us and for his teammates and for the program so he can't go out and perform because, when he's at his best, he's such a unique and exciting player. I just think you're not going to get an opportunity to coach many old school, true captain-type players like him. They're just going to be so rare.”

Jackson has been in Storrs for three years and he’s beloved in Connecticut. Imagine how they feel about him along the banks of the Hudson, where he spent the first 18 years of his life. He grew up as part of a massive family in Amsterdam, and all those siblings and aunts and uncles and cousins, and beyond, will be on hand Friday.

His former high school and AAU teams will attend. His brother Marcus, a freshman player at the University at Albany, was there Thursday and will be back Friday. Jackson's father, Andre Sr., a former high-flying player himself known as “Rabbit,” was taking a train from his home in Virginia to Albany for the game. There will be friends of friends, and friends of those friends, scattered throughout the arena.

“I wasn't really thinking about where it was going to be,” Jackson said. “I was just thinking about trying to make a run and just try to have as good a season as possible. Once I found out it was in Albany, it was definitely a cool thing. Definitely something that not a lot of people experience is playing an NCAA Tournament game in their own hometown. But I'm definitely looking forward to just getting out on the court and playing.”

Jackson is averaging 6.7 points, 6.3 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 28.7 minutes for the Huskies (25-8), the No. 4 seed in the West Region. This is the best team Hurley has had at UConn and, therefore, the best one Jackson has been on.

The Huskies lost first-round games as the higher seed each of the past two years so they’re trying to avoid having a minor negative footnote become a full-blown panic. Jackson’s ups and downs, his adjustments to the dare-to-shoot defense that many teams play against him, have been well documented.

Nobody has been more unpredictable for the team, at times.

Nobody has been more stable for the program, always.

“Within 30 minutes of me moving into my room last summer, I got a call from Andre and he said, ‘Let’s go get some shots up,’” freshman center Donovan Clingan said. “We were there probably two and a half hours and he was telling me what it takes, every day, to play for UConn. He told me what practice is like, how Coach Hurley is. He told me you can’t be afraid of anything, to just get out there and be ready to compete. He definitely helped me get ready for what was coming. He’s just such a team guy. Me and Andrew [Hurley] always talk about it, how Andre doesn’t care if he has zero points. Whatever it takes to help his team win, he’s going to do it. Every team needs someone like that, and we’ve got that guy. Love the kid to death.”

Of what he’s learned from Jackson about what it means to be a successful UConn player, sophomore guard Jordan Hawkins said, “Effort every day in practice. He brings it every day. You've got to be an everyday guy to succeed in this program.”

Freshman guard Alex Karaban added, “I'd also just say the communication skills he has, how he is as a leader just bringing the best out of everyone.”

Jackson, an elite defender, ran into early foul trouble and fouled out of UConn’s loss to Marquette in a Big East Tournament semifinal last week in New York. He managed just 15 minutes, finishing with two points, two assists and a rebound.

“He's an invaluable player, the impact he has all over the court,” Hurley said. “What he does on the backboard, both glasses, as like a shutdown cornerback on the defensive end. Then he's figured out how to play offense when people are playing him soft. So I think coming into that Marquette game where he got in foul trouble, he had really found how to crack the code based on how he was being guarded. When he's on, he's one of the most exciting players to watch in college basketball. I mean, Action Jackson.”

All Jackson wants to do is win. He’s said that numerous times over the past few years. He knows, as a defensive player, that’s his ticket to the successful professional career. He’s not focused on that, though.

“He really stands by that, that he doesn’t want to talk about that,” Altieri said. “This is his chapter, the moment he’s living in right now and he wants to do the best he can at this level. When that time comes, he’ll worry about that. But you can’t worry about that and do well here, in my opinion. He came to UConn to win a national title.

“He’s always had the attitude of team first. He’s always been that guy. But he really did, these last three years, just lean in to what Coach Hurley was telling him he wanted out of the team. Coach Hurley pretty much developed him as the team leader.”

Hurley had just come over, walked to the front row of the stands to wave to the family, give Altieri a hug and whisper something to her. Altieri didn’t take her seat for a while. She moved around section 105, greeting all sorts of people making their way into the arena to see her son.

There’s no way she’ll be able to greet all of them Friday afternoon. Tip-off is scheduled for 4:30. UConn is looking to advance to face the winner of the Virginia Commonwealth-St. Mary’s game that precedes it.

“We work all year long in practice and in games to get to this point,” Jackson said. “Not every team gets to make it here. This is definitely the biggest stage, but at the end of the day, we're just going to stick to our identity and stick to what we do all season. I think that's good enough to get us some wins in this tournament. We're one of the better teams in this tournament, for sure.”