There is a self-depreciating part of Kia Nurse's personality when she is off the court that is often in stark contrast to the relentless manner in which she plays basketball.

Nurse is known to poke fun at herself in her dealings with the media with an infectious bout of laughter being included as she makes herself the punch line in her own brand of humor.

However, after missing all six of her shots and being held scoreless for the first time all season in a blowout win at Tulane on Wednesday night, Nurse had a much different demeanor.

The camera was panned on the UConn bench when Nurse came out of the game for the final time. While her teammates were in a playful mood, Nurse's mood seemed to range somewhere between downtrodden and downright furious. Uncharacteristically she got up from her seat and walked down towards the end of the bench as the camera focused on her exuberant teammates.

UConn coach Geno Auriemma and his staff picked up on Nurse's discontent.

"I think sometimes Kia puts a little too much emphasis on scoring, making shots and contributing that way offensively I think unnecessarily," Auriemma said. "There are a lot of things that Kia Nurse does to help our team be where we are today at both ends of the floor, offensively and defensively. For her to feel that way about not making shots, about coming up scoreless, I don't think that is good for her to be in that frame of mind so it was something that we addressed after the game for sure."

Nurse was coming off a summer to remember, leading Canada to the Pan Am Games gold medal and the FIBA Americas Championship for Women. She dropped 33 points on a U.S. team led by UConn teammates Moriah Jefferson and Breanna Stewart in the Pan Am title game and her outstanding play in the FIBA Americas event clinched a spot in the Olympics for Canada. The feeling was that Nurse was going to use her brilliant play with the Canadian national team into being more of an offensive force as a sophomore with the Huskies.

As UConn heads into Saturday's American Athletic Conference home game against East Carolina at Gampel Pavilion (1 p.m., SNY), the numbers show how much of an offensive struggle it has been for Nurse.

After 21 games as a freshman Nurse was shooting 55 percent from the field including a remarkable 47.7 percent from 3-point range. In 17 games when she attempted at least two 3-pointers, she shot 40 percent or better 11 times. She is currently shooting less than 41 percent including 31 percent from 3-point range. Nurse has seven straight games where she failed to score in double figures and shooting only 25 percent from behind the 3-point line.

Knowing how much pressure Nurse puts on herself to succeed, her position coach has come up with a rule to try to alleviate some of the unnecessary stress Nurse might be feeling to live up to the expectations.

"I have been a little more active off the ball in other ways. Watching film helps you think about it and think about ways to get your teammates open so that once you make a play obviously your mind is off of it," Nurse said. "If I miss a shot or two shots, you are kind of dreading those and we (Nurse and assistant coach Shea Ralph) kind of came up with you've got three seconds to be mad that you missed a shot and move on from that.

"I don't necessarily hold onto it. I will be angry that I missed it. Obviously you don't want to miss wide-open shots. You don't want teams to leave you open and be a liability for the rest of the team. I have gotten used to 'well that didn't go in, onto the next one' or 'knock this one in. OK, let's do something.'"

Nurse often guards the other team's top perimeter offensive threat. Her assist/turnover ratio is right around what it was a season ago when she had one of the best marks for a freshman in program history. Another statistic worthy of mention is that UConn is 57-0 in games that Nurse has started.

"I think as you get older and you play more basketball, you realize that there are nights when you can get 25 and nights when you are not," Auriemma said. "You can't base how well you played based on how well you shot the ball, and that is something we reinforce all the time. Making shots doesn't mean you played well and missing shots doesn't mean you've played poorly."