The Guru Report: ‘Nova Pounds Georgetown While Penn Falls and Princeton Wins in Ivies

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

VILLANOVA — The Villanova women were not trying to show off Saturday afternoon to a large contingent of alumnae greats of yesteryear and near-yesteryear that anything they had done in the storied history of the program the current group was capable of better.

It just seemed that way as they sought to atone for last month’s 68-63 loss to Big East traveling partner Georgetown in Washington.

A week ago the Wildcats’ four-game win streak got crushed in losses at frontrunners DePaul and then-No. 8 Marquette on a trip to the Midwest through Chicago and Milwaukee.

On Saturday, however, it was Villanova which unleashed a prowess on both ends of the floor that turned more heads here in Finneran Pavilion than Father Damien dealt with on the Hoyas’ campus in the movie Exorcist.

Coach Harry Perretta’s bunch shot an incredible 37-for-57 for 64.9 percent from the floor, including a more astounding 17-for-18 near perfect 94.4 percent in the third quarter on the way to a 91-43 victory, surely one of the largest ever against a Big East foe.

In that third stanza as the Wildcats (16-9, 7-7 Big East) moved back to a .500 record in the league and tie for fourth place, Villanova outscored Georgetown 39-14 to make the score 77-30 with still 10 minutes to play.

‘Nova also was 12-of-22 on three-point attempts and 5-of-9 from the line. 

The differential ultimately grew to as much as 53 points against the Hoyas (11-14, 5-9) as four Wildcats scored in double figures.

It was the kind of game that nearly most of the early alumnae posing for the overall group picture experienced regularly against UConn on the winning side and the more recent stars endured with three notable exceptions as losses when the Huskies were in the conference.

Kelly Jekot had a game-high 22 points, shooting 10-for-12 while Mary Gedaka had 21 points shooting 10 -for-11. Jannah Tucker scored 14 points shooting 5-for-6, including  4-of-6 three-balls, and Adrianna Hahn scored 11.

Tayanna Jones scored 10 for Georgetown.

Asked whether he had alum and Drexel coach Denise Dillon give a pre-game pep talk on defense since her Dragons lead the nation, Perretta said, “I didn’t do anything. I just sat there and watched.

“When you start making shots, I’m telling you, it just demoralizes your opponents. They come down and they hit three, boom they’re scoring almost every possession, you just start missing shots, and the game just snowballs into what you see.

 “Especially in the third quarter when they came out, they went zone. I think we shot 16 for 17 in the third quarter. I mean, it doesn’t matter what you do on defense. You can play no [defense] and shoot 16 for 17 and open up the lead.”

Most fans thought they were coming to see a low-scoring defensive grind out the way many games in the series between these two schools have gone.

“Last game, we were up 10, up 8 with 5 minutes to go and didn’t score,” Perretta said. “Our defense wasn’t very good late in the game, so our kids really worked on their defense this week, and again, they played really good [defense] early. When (Villanova) started making shots, it just compounded into what you saw.”

 

Tucker drew the defensive assignment on Dorothy Adomako, the Hoyas leading scorer (16.0 ppg.), holding her to eight points.

“I thought her effort was great on defense. You know she had to guard their best player,” Perretta said. “I thought all our kids played great defense but she’s the only one with the physical capabilities to guard her.”

Villanova next hosts St. John’s Friday night at 7 looking to sweep the Red Storm, who pulled the stunning rally Friday night to give league leader Marquette it’s first conference loss.

“I said on media day I thought talent-wise, St. John’s was second best on talent in the league,” Perretta said reacting to the news from New York.

Penn falls to Harvard in Double OT While Princeton Wins at Dartmouth

The first half of the Ivy regular season race is over and the complexion of the league race has made another alteration as Penn, still in front, came back to the pack in a double overtime loss at Harvard 80-72 at the Crimson’s Lavietes Pavilion in Cambridge, Mass., and Princeton made its move, as usual, on the shoulders of Bella Alarie to rally at Dartmouth for an 82-75 win at the Big Green’s Leede Arena Saturday night in Hanover, N.H.

Yale, meanwhile, got edged 43-41 at home in an upset by Cornell while Columbia edged host Brown 83-81 in Providence, R.I.

Penn (16-4, 6-1 Ivy) and Princeton (13-9, 5-2) were the only other two Guru D-1 locals who played Saturday.

Ironically, the Penn men lost at home in The Palestra to Harvard in overtime.

There was a point Saturday where a few bounces here and there might have made the race for the four spots in next month’s Ivy tournament at Yale in New Haven, Conn. wide open for Penn in terms of landing the number one seed.

But after two straight back to back weekends in which the Quakers won by landslides on Fridays and then narrow escapes on Saturday, this time Penn got scathed going down fighting.

Thus, from just the Ivy record Penn is 6-1, Princeton is a game back at 5-2, and Yale fell into a third place tie with Harvard at 5-3.

Outside the last qualifying spot Dartmouth, Cornell and Columbia are tied for fifth two games back with six left so here on out look for a bunch of wild weekends.

Penn has a five-game home stand beginning next weekend which we’ll discuss after the recap of how it went down for the Quakers.

The die seemed cast well before the end of regulation when Harvard (12-9, 5-3) reached a 10-point lead in the third period but Penn fought back  before the Crimson’s Jadyn Bush hit two foul shots near the finish to force the first overtime.

Michae Jones, who had all 15 of her career-high total points after halftime, kept the game alive for the Quakers, scoring with 2.5 seconds left to make it a double overtime encounter.

But the next five minutes belonged to Harvard, who got 17 points from Madeline Raster, 16 from Bush, 13 from Sydney Spencer, and 12 from Katie Benzan.

Penn holds a four-game lead over the three outsiders to get the the tournament and have swept all of them in the first half of Ivy competition.

Eleah Parker had another standout game with 21 points, 13 rebounds, four blocked shots, two assists, and was a career-best 9-for-12 on the line.

Princess Aghayere also had a career night with 19 points, while Ashley Russell had 10 points and 12 rebounds.

It’s Penn’s first overtime loss since a Big Five setback at home to La Salle on Dec. 7, 2016, an appropriate date in which the Quakers twice blew significant leads down the stretches of regulation and the overtime won by the Explorers at the buzzer.

The last double overtime loss was at Harvard in 2011.

In the end the setback was in the style of losses to Villanova with Harvard nailing 10 three pointers to just two from the Quakers.

Next Friday Penn hosts Columbia at 5:30 while Princeton hosts Cornell at the same time while on Saturday the Quakers host Cornell at 4:30 while the Tigers host Columbia at 5:30 p.m.

Then Penn goes for the sweep of Princeton, hosting the Tigers Tuesday, Feb. 26, at 7 p.m.

Thus if things are still up for grabs for positioning  at thevb there will be no last day head-to-head theatrics like the days before the tournament.

Meanwhile on the Princeton side of things the Tigers keep clawing back from adversity.

First it was the roster depletion at the beginning of the season due to injury that included reigning Ivy player of the year Bella Alarie contributing to the rare seven game losing streak till her return.

Next came the surprise hit from Penn at home in the Ivy opener at Jadwin Gym.

Last week there was another home upset at the hands of Yale putting Courtney Banghart’s group two games behind the top seed, though with the new tournament in its third year the situation was still short of dire for the overwhelming preseason favorites.

However, Saturday night at the end of one period at Dartmouth, the Big Green had raced to a 20-6 lead.

Not to worry. 

Two weeks after her historic 45-point game at Columbia, Alarie struck again pouring 41 points shooting 16-for-24 from the field and grabbed 13 rebounds to rally Princeton to an 82-75 victory.

With help from Harvard knocking off Penn the Tigers are one game off the Quakers with the second head to head coming a week from Tuesday at The Palestra.

In between while the Quakers play them in reverse, Princeton will host Cornell Friday and Columbia Saturday both at 5:30 p.m.

Alarie joins Penn’s Diana Caramanico (1999) (2001) as the only two Ivy women to have multiple games of 40 or more points and the Bethesda, Md., native now has three of the four all-time scores in the Tigers program history.

In the win at Dartmouth, Gabrielle Rush had 14 points for the visitors and Carlie Littlefield scored 13 points.

Isalys Quinones had 22 for the Big Green, whose margin for error has been greatly reduced to make the four-team field.

Small Colleges: Cruise Time For Rosemont, Jefferson and USciences

Starting with Division III Rosemont, the Ravens join two Cabrini squads in 2014 and 2018  as the only teams to go 16-0 in the Colonial States Athletic Conference after Saturday’s regular season-ending 82-47 victory up at Cedar Crest in Allentown. 

The Ravens (22-3, 16-0) who now have new program records for win streak at 17, overall wins, and conference perfection, have a bye with second seeded Keystone to open the  semifinals Wednesday at Alumnae Hall near Villanova at 7 against Monday’s lowest-seed survivor among 6-Wilson, 5-Centenary or 4-Cairn.

In Saturday’s win, Ashley Murray had 16 points and 15 rebounds, Ke’alohilani Naone-Carter scored 16 points, Shown Dowd had 15, and Shirle Brown scored 14 points.

Locally in Division II, Jefferson U and USciences continue to each have one loss at the hands of each other.

On Saturday Jefferson, which had been at an all-time high at second in both WBCA and D2SIDA polls but dropped to ninth after the recent loss to the Devils in Southwest Philadelphia, won at Concordia in lower New York state in Bronxville 74-46 as Jessica Kaminski posted 23 points on 9-of-12 shooting, nine rebounds, eight assists, four steals and one block.

Sophomore Caitlyn Cunningham went over 20 points for the fourth straight game, finishing with a game-high 29, while adding four rebounds, four assists, three steals and one block. She was 12-for-19 from the field for the Rams (23-1, 24-1,CACC). Sophomore Sabria Lytes contributed with 11 points off the bench, shooting 5-for-6.

Next up is Tuesday’s 6 p.m. visit to Georgian Court in Lakewood, N.J.

USciences was at home in the Bobby Morgan Arena and easily handled Nyack 67-44 off a dominating 22-5 second quarter as the No. 5 Devils (23-1, 14-1 CACC) in both polls held the visitors to just two points over the final 7:12 of the period, which saw Shannon May score her career-high nine points.  

Also setting a new career-best on the day was Alyx McKiernan, who made her second career start and scored eight of her game-high 11 in the first half. 

Irisa Ye also tallied 11 points on a perfect 5-of-5 shooting, while Keyes contributed 10 off the bench. 

Jess Huber added eight off the bench to make it five Devils with at least eight points, as the USciences bench totaled 36 points on the afternoon. 

University of the Sciences also won the turnover battle, 19-11, which led to a 22-4 edge in points off turnovers for the Devils. 

Mikaela Giuliani forced three of those turnovers with a career-high three steals, while also stuffing the stat sheet with five rebounds, a career-best four blocks, four points and three assists. 

Alex Thomas led USciences with five assists. 

University of the Sciences goes for its 14th straight win on Tuesday when it travels to Wilmington for a 6 p.m. tip.

Looking Ahead

In local D-1 games Sunday, Temple hosts Cincinnati in McGonigle Hall in the AAC, St. Joseph’ s plays at La Salle in Tom Gola Arena in their second A-10 matchup as the visiting Hawks go for their fourth straight and host Explorers chase their second conference win; Penn State is at Minnesota in the Big Ten, Drexel hosts Northeastern while Delaware hosts Hofstra in the CAA, all games at 2, while Rider hosts Manhattan in the MAAC at 1 p.m.

And that’s the report.