The Guru Report: It’s a Sweep Night For Locals

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

VILLANOVA, Pa. — Five of the Guru’s Local D-1 teams that composed the Friday night schedule were anything but cold, no matter what the outdoor temperatures read, combining to make it a perfect sweep on the winning side with a bunch of historical achievements also involved.

Right here, for example, in Finneran Pavilion, Villanova extended its current win streak to three in the Big East with a wire-to-wire 53-33 win over Providence to earn a split on the season with the Friars (13-9, 5-5 Big East), in a game in which the Wildcats (14-7, 5-5) held the visitors to four points each in the first two quarters as well as the Providence total being a season-low in points allowed.

“It’s funny,” said Villanova veteran coach Harry Perretta. “Up there we score 61 points and we lose (67-61), down here we score 53 and we beat them by 20.”

The win put Villanova in a three-way tie for fourth with Creighton (10-11, 4-6) coming here Sunday afternoon a 2 p.m.

As for historical note, that was provided by graduate student Adrianna Hahn, who connected with four three-balls, just enough to bring her career total to 284, eclipsing Trish Juhline (1999-03) for the the new all-time best in Villanova history.

“I am truly honored,” Hahn said of the mark set late in the game and adding how Juhline was one of her favorite Wildcats long before the Wilmington native enrolled here on the Main Line. “It was something I set in the beginning of the year, so now I am trying to get to three hundred. That’s my next goal along with a win on Sunday.

“My Dad used to teach me, shoot from far out. I said I’m never going to shoot this in a game, or I’m not strong enough. But now it paid off because I can shoot it from anywhere. I thank him for that.”

Hahn and Kelly Jekot, who shot 6-for-11 overall from the field, each scored 14 points, and Mary Gedaka fired 5-for-7 and finished with 13 point and also grabbed eight rebounds.

When Villanova lost at Providence, several players were sidelined with injuries or illness.

No one on the Friars scored in double figures with with leading scorer Jovana Nogic limited to eight points.

“Now that we play everybody again, I think we will get those wins that we lost,” Hahn said. “Now that we are on a winning streak we can beat those teams. 

“We have more confidence in ourselves. We are running the same stuff we’ve been running, but better and we are doing better defensively,” she continued.

“Last weekend set us up for this game, and tonight should help us for Sunday,” Jekot said. “Every game in the Big East we can win or lose, so we have to come prepared.”

Road warriors. In Pursuit of Ivy and CAA glory.

The other four Guru locals in action were all on the road with Penn and Princeton resuming their Ivy chase following their one league game three weeks ago when Penn upset favored Princeton away in Jadwin Gym in the Ivy opener.

Penn and Princeton both dominated Friday night with Penn topping Cornell 59-46 in the Big Red’s Newman Arena in Ithaca,N.Y.

Eliah Parker reset her career scoring best for the second time in several weeks, collecting 26 points and adding another collegiate milestone with her six blocks while her 12 rebounds gave the sophomore 13 career double doubles with the Quakers (12-3, 2-0 Ivy), the lone unbeaten Ivy team early in the league season.

Phoebe Sterba added 11 points and Princess Aghayere had 10 points and five rebounds making it five straight wins the Quakers have posted in the series with Cornell (4-7, 1-2). 

Surging from a halftime lead, coach Mike McLaughlin’s group built on the advantage expanding the differential to 23 points at 48-25 late in the third period.

Penn, one of the top defensive teams in the nation, is now 7-1 on the road, the one loss in early November at the season’s outset when the Quakers fell at defending champion Notre Dame, then ranked No. 1.

The only Cornell player to score in double figures was Laura Bagwell-Katalinich, who had 20 points.

Penn finishes up the weekend swing Saturday night at Columbia at 5:30 p.m. in the Lions’ Levien Gymnasium at New York City’s Upper West Side off Broadway. The game will air on ESPN+.

Princeton, meanwhile, is doing the road tour in reverse of Penn and started at Columbia beating the Lions 79-64   with reigning Ivy player of the year Bella Alarie setting league marks with 45 points and 20 field goals.

She missed the front part of the season with a broken shoulder as the Tigers (9-8, 1-1 Ivy) after an opening win at nearby Rider dropped seven straight before they reversed direction until running into Penn’s visit.

On Friday night, Alarie was 20-for-28 from the field with 14 rebounds and her four blocks made her the new Tigers career leader with 160, besting the previous Princeton mark of 157 by Ellen Devoe ’86.

Bill Bradley was the only other Princeton men’s or women’s player to score at least 45 points in a game.

Carlie Littlefield added 18 points with a career-high nine rebounds against Columbia (5-11, 1-2) and Sydney Jordan had eight rebounds.

"It feels amazing to be able to accomplish this in an Ivy League game because I know these games mean a lot more to my team," Alarie said. "Our ultimate goal is to get a ring, win the Ivy Championship and go to the NCAA Tournament so I played my heart out and my teammates got me in great spots to score."

Columbia’s Riley Casey had 22 points and Janiya Clemmons had 16.

Princeton will finish its weekend trip tipping off at Cornell at 5 p.m.

Drexel, meanwhile, got revenge for last season’s home loss in the Colonial Athletic Association championship, winning at Elon 59-44 in the Schar Center  near Greensboro, N.C., while Delaware was victorious at William & Mary 70-59 at Kaplan Arena in Williamsburg, Va.

For Drexel (14-5, 6-2 CAA), which is now tied with Towson for second a game behind preseason favorite James Madison, it was the first win at Elon (7-12, 2-6) since 2016.

The Dragons, who lead the nation in scoring defense, also are tied for the lead with Oregon State of the Pac-12 for first in true consecutive road wins at 11. 

They have also won six straight games to right themselves after dropping their first two CAA games, which were at home early last month against Towson and JMU. 

In Friday night’s win Bailey Greenberg was the only Drexel player scoring in double figures, collecting 24 points. She is just two short of becoming the 25th member of the Dragons’ career 1,000 point club and against Elon had a career-high nine rebounds.

Drexel forced 22 turnovers.

Elon’s Emily Maupin had 14 points for Elon and Ariel Colon scored 11.

Drexel’s road weekend continues Sunday at 2 p.m. at William & Mary.

Meanwhile, Delaware added to its historical note as second-year coach Natasha Adair gained her 100th victory, including previous stops at Charleston, which is also in the CAA, and at Georgetown in the Big East.

Abby Gonzalez had 16 points for the Blue Hens (9-11, 4-4 CAA), who have won a season-best three straight, and Lizzie Oleary had 10 points and a career-high seven rebounds, which she once previous achieved.

Jasmine Dickey had nine points and 10 rebounds.

Delaware owned the boards tin this one 40-26.

Victoria Reynolds has 14 points, leading three other players scoring in in double figures, for the Tribe (11-8, 4-4).

Delaware finishes its weekend in reverse order from Drexel on the road, visiting Elon Sunday at 2 p.m.

Nationally Noted: Oregon Tops Utah

The national highlight game of the night was found where they are usually located these Fridays, which is  over in the PAC-12 where No. 4 Oregon closed on a 27–6 run at home in Eugene to beat No. 14 Utah 87-65 and stay alone in first and unbeaten in conference play.

But the Ducks (20-1, 9-0 Pac-12) were in danger of being the next upset victim in conference by the Utes until Satou Sabally got Oregon untracked scoring 13 of her 20 points in a four-minute scoring span in the second half.

Megan Huff had a career-high 38 points for Utah (18-2, 7-2), which last weekend took down California and then-No. 6 Stanford.

In a game in the Big Ten unranked Michigan upset No. 13 Iowa, 90-81, as the Wolverines (13-9, 4-6 Big Ten) dominated the boards 44-23, including 24 on the offensive glass.

Michigan’s Deja Church and Akinrah Johnson each had career highs of 19 points.

Megan Gustafson, who has monopolized the Big Ten player of the week honors, had 27 points and nine rebounds for the Hawkeyes (16-5, 7-3).

Looking Ahead: Temple Tries to Extend Win Streak

Besides the two Ivy games mentioned above involving Penn and Princeton, the only other local in action at the D-1 level Saturday has Temple visiting Wichita State at 7:30 p.m. as the Owls try to extend their modest win streak to three in the American Athletic Conference.

Nationally, Stanford, which lost at the buzzer to Bay Area rival California on Thursday in the Pac-12, now hosts the Bears just two days later.

Old Dominion visits C-USA leader Rice trying to extend the Lady Monarchs’ win streak.

Sunday, locally, besides the CAA and Big East games, in the Atlantic 10 Saint Joseph’s hosts league leader VCU at 2 p.m. while at the same time La Salle, still looking for its first conference win, visits the other league leader Davidson in North Carolina.

Rider visits MAAC ruler Quinnipiac at 1 p.m.

In the Big Ten, Penn State will be hosting Iowa at 2 and No. 17 Rutgers will visit Minnesota at 4 p.m. in Minneapolis in the first of two home-and-home games with the Gophers as the Scarlet Knights look to stay alone in first.

And that’s the report.