The Guru Report: Villanova Nips St. Johns in OT While Drexel Heads to Showdown Sunday

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

VILLANOVA, Pa. – After the smoke cleared showing the Villanova women with a 66-64 overtime victory here against St. John’s in the Big East Friday night at Finneran Pavilion, veteran coach Harry Perretta sounded more like a fan who had to sit on edge in the latter stages of the game while his team pulled a rabbit out of the hat reclaiming a seeming victory that had slipped away.

“I don’t know how we won the game,” Perretta said in disbelief. “We won the game at the three-point line, right? Cause they had more field goals than we had (27-22), right? We won the game by making more threes (10-2), right?

“That’s what I thought. That’s eight points there, that’s how we won the game.”

In the process, the Wildcats (12-9, 6-4 Big East) made program history, winning the season series against the Red Storm (13-8, 6-4) by making it the first time such an occurrence occurred by accomplishing each victory in overtime.

“They got five more field goals. I don’t even want to try to figure it out,” Perretta said.

Several weeks ago, Villanova came back to steal one against St. John’s 67-62 in overtime up at Carnesecca Arena in Queens on Long Island.

Elsewhere among the five Guru local Division I teams that saw action, the Colonial Athletic Association showdown Sunday for sole possession of first place at Drexel was set with the Dragons winning at home over Towson while James Madison won at Delaware to keep the two tied at the top.

Princeton won at Dartmouth in the Ivy League to open a two-game lead over Penn, which fell at Harvard.

 Back here, freshman Maddy Siegrist had another standout performance for the Wildcats with a game-high 22 points, while Mary Gedaka had a double-double of 16 points and 13 rebounds, Bridget Herlihy grabbed nine rebounds and other players hit some key shots to complement the offense.

Siegrist has 11 20-point games this season and in all but one of the 21 she has played she has scored in double figures. Gedaka played all 45 minutes, the eighth game this year she has played the entire time.

 St. John’s Alissa Alston scored 21, while Alisha Kebbe, a Neumann-Goretti grad celebrating her annual homecoming appearance, had a double-double of 13 points and 14 rebounds, and Qadashah Hoppie scored 10.

“I said to the TV people, I know Maddy and Mary played great, you have to give them credit, but we won the game basically because Raven (James) hit two threes, Cameron (Onken) hit a three, so the other kids contributed by scoring the ball. That’s the only way we can win, by making threes and having other players contribute,” Perretta explained.

“Poor Sam Carangi, we put her in for defense, she has the bad back, she had an injury, she fell, she gave up a layup. We don’t know who to put in the game, we have so many kids hurt and everything. We’re just trying to do the best we can and hope the other players can step up,” he continued.

Carangi scored eight points.

It was a wild night in the Big East with No. 11 DePaul getting hit with its first conference setback, being edged at home in Chicago by Creighton, 63-61, while Butler at home avoided an upset beating Xavier 63-61 in overtime.

Seton Hall, which comes here Sunday at 1 p.m., beat Georgetown, 61-47, while Marquette topped Providence 85-55.

That left DePaul’s lead over the rest of the Big East reduced to two games ahead of Marquette and Butler at 7-3, while Villanova moved into a fourth-place tie with St. John’s, Creighton and Seton Hall atd 6-4.

“We’re not even looking at standings,” Perretta said. “We’re just taking it one game at a time, we’re just happy to get any win. We’re trying to play the best we can and steal as many wins as we can.

“The whole conference is crazy. I would have bet $1 million we could not beat them twice in the same season. $1 million. That’s why I can’t explain basketball anymore. In some ways I’m glad I’m getting out because I can’t explain it anymore.”

Perretta, prior to the season opener, announced that his 42 seasons in coaching, all out here on the Main Line, would be his last as heads into retirement.

In this one the home team broke from a 12-11 deficit to a 10-0 run on the back end of the first quarter. 

The Wildcats got cold in the third and St. John’s reduced a seven-point deficit to go up by four at the end of the third. 

Down five with 2 minutes, 12 seconds in regulation, Siegrist made an old-fashioned three-point play and then neither team could score until Siegrist made a shot outside the paint to send it into overtime with three seconds left.

James hit a three at the outset of the extra period and Villanova never trailed  though the differential got down to one with 17 seconds left.

Siegrist made a free throw two seconds later and the Red Storm were unable to score to force another period.

As mentioned, Seton Hall comes here Sunday at 1 p.m.

Drexel and James Madison Win to Set Up Another CAA Showdown

The Dragons got revenge Friday night for losing to Towson in last season’s conference title game, beating the Tigers at home 59-50 in the Daskalakis Athletic Center while down at Delaware, the Blue Hens fell to preseason favorite James Madison 60-39 to leave the winners still locked in a first-place tie heading into Sunday’s showdown at Drexel at 2 p.m.

It’s the first meeting of the season between the two with the stakes no different than many previous times in the recent past when the two have faced each other.

On Friday, Drexel (14-6, 7-1 CAA) almost got caught by another closing rally from Towson (10-9, 5-3), which trimmed a 16-point deficit to three late in the fourth quarter.

The Dragons were able to build the first-half bulge off nine triplets, a season high.

Bailey Greenberg, the reigning CAA player of the year, had a game-high 19 points and with her career total reaching 1,607 points, she moved into sixth place on Drexel’s all-time list for scorers. She also had seven rebounds and five assists.

Hannah Nilhll had 11 points, while Aubree Brown scored seven and dished six assists, while Kate Connolly had had nine points and seven rebounds.

“It’s a big win for us,” said Drexel coach Denise Dillon. “Where we stand, rolling along in the season, it’s our first go against Towson, we saw we had a lot of work to do. So I was really proud of the girls responding, taking that first punch, and coming out, ready to go.

“I was really pleased with our offensive execution in the first half and we’re going to learn how to readjust when a team makes a run in the second half.”

Towson opened with a 7-0 run before the Dragons then mounted a rally to take control of the game.

“I thought we played, waiting to see what they were going to do, instead of us stepping on the floor and doing what we do – on the defensive end dictating what the other team is going to do,” Dillon said.

“On the offensive end, just execute the basics of the offense – setting a screen and taking what they would give us. But, yeah, we settled in and made some threes and that just brings you back into the game, quickly,” she explained.

“It was big Hannah wanting to take those shots,” Dillon said of Nihill’s trio of three-pointers in the first half.

As for Sunday, Dillon said, “You’re here, you get Towson first, it’s a great win, and then you get ready for what you need to do against a great JMU team.”

In the Dukes’ 60-39 win at Delaware, the Blue Hens (6-13, 2-6 CAA) were held under 40 points for the first time since a 40-37 loss to Towson 11 seasons ago on March 12, 2009.

Jasmine Dickey had eight points and a game-high 15 rebounds for Delaware, which shot a near-season high of 72 field goal attempts but made just a season-low 16 for a 22.2 percent shooting average.

“We competed throughout the game and got the shots that we want,” said Delaware coach Natasha Adair. “We just have to find a way to make the shots we’re making in practice in the game.”

JMU (16-3, 7-1) got 18 points and 12 rebounds from Kamiah Smalls, the Neumann-Goretti grad making her annual weekend homecoming visit. Jackie Benitez and Lexie Barrier each scored 14 points.

Delaware on Sunday will host Towson at 1 p.m.

Princeton Blasts Dartmouth as Penn Falls at Harvard

In a 66-34 win at Dartmouth, it didn’t take much for Princeton to shake off the rust from its annual three-week hiatus for academics, the last time the Tigers will undergo the experience with a change in the calendar coming next season.

Princeton (14-1, 2-0 Ivy) last played at Penn to take the Ivy opener.

Bella Alarie, the two-time reigning Ivy player of the year for the two-time defending league champs, had 23 points and eight rebounds, while Julia Cunningham scored 10 points.

Kealy Brown had 11 points for Dartmouth (7-9, 1-2) in the game at Edward Leedy Arena in Hanover, N.H.

Princeton, whose only loss was in overtime at Iowa, now has won at least 10 straight games for six times in the last 10 years.

The Tigers head to Harvard to finish the road trip Saturday at 5 p.m.

Meanwhile, Penn has landed in an unfamiliar place in terms of the last decade, with the 58-51 loss to the Crimson at Lavietes Pavilion in Boston.

The slow start Friday night led to an extension of the losing streak to four games for the Quakers (10-5, 0-2 Ivy), now two games down to Princeton and Yale in the early stage of the Ivy race.

Fortunately, the Penn rally to get closer in the game at the site of this year’s Ivy tourney may be a bright spot.

Furthermore, instead of being in a near-fatal situation, the key is still in the new world just get to the top four in the standings to get to the postseason where the Quakers have won the first league tourney crown and finished runner up to Princeton in the next two.

In this one, freshman sensation Kayla Padilla didn’t shoot all that great from the field, 6-for-25 of which three were triplets, but she still scored 21 points, while Tori Crawford had 10 points and a career high 14 rebounds for the Quakers. Phoebe Sterba also had a career-high with nine rebounds.

Lola Mullaney had 20 points for Harvard (11-5, 2-1) and Jeannie Boehm had 10 points and 16 rebounds.

A two-point second quarter sent the visitors to a 32-13 deficit of 19 points, of which Penn rallied from to get to as close as five points late in the game.

Penn finishes the trip Saturday at Dartmouth at 5 p.m.

Nationally Noted: Arizona Routs UCLA While Arizona State Beats Southern Cal in Triple Overtime

The desert schools of the PAC-12 were where the most notable action in the conference occurred Friday night as No. 16 Arizona cruised over No. 8 UCLA 92-66 at home in Tucson while up north in Tempe, Sun Devils veteran coach Charli Turner Thorne got her 500^th victory in a 76-75 thriller for No. 16 Arizona State in overtime over Southern Cal.

In the blowout, Aari McDonald had 27 points for Arizona (17-3, 6-3 PAC-12) and Sam Thomas scored 20.

Michaela Onyenwere had 17 points for the visiting Bruins (18-2, 7-2) and freshman Charisma Osborne scored 14.

UCLA heads to Arizona State Sunday for a 2 p.m. (EST) tip against a Sun Devils squad the Bruins beat 68-66 on Jan. 3 in Los Angeles.

In the win by Arizona State (16-5, 6-3), Reili Richardson had 19 of her career-high 24 points in the second half, including the triple overtimes. She also hit the game-winner to give the Sun Devils a season-sweep of the Trojans (11-9, 3-6).

Turner Thorne won 40 games at Northern Arizona before collecting 460 at ASU into Friday night.

Recently as an unranked team, the Sun Devils swept both Oregon and Oregon State on a weekend when both teams were ranked in the Top 5 nationally.

Elsewhere, as mentioned, Creighton in the Big East upset No. 11 DePaul 63-61 on the road, likely depriving the Blue Demons a chance to move into the Top 10, which will probably lose UCLA off the loss to Arizona.

The Bluejays rallied from a 20-point deficit to DePaul at the half.

No. 2 Baylor romped at Texas 64-44 and No. 6 Stanford topped Washington 58-41

Looking Ahead: Rider Seeks to Extend Streak and Keep Grip on MAAC

Having opened up a two-game lead with a perfect record in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and holding a program-record 13-win streak overall, the Broncs will seek to maintain all that hosting Monmouth at 2 p.m. on Alumni Day Saturday in Alumni Gymnasium in Lawrenceville, N.J.

La Salle looks to extend a two-game win streak and three of four when the Explorers visit Fordham in the Atlantic 10 at 2 p.m. Saturday at Rose Hill Gym in the Bronx.

As mentioned with the two of the Guru local D-1 teams in the Ivies, switching off, Penn visits Dartmouth while Princeton is at Harvard, both games at 5 p.m.

In a matchup that once upon a time was a national 1 vs 2 showdown out of the Associated Press poll, Old Dominion (17-3) hosts Louisiana Tech (10-9) in a C-USA game in Norfolk, Va.

The Small College locals, which have been doing well, are back on the court this weekend.

 In action in the Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference all on Saturday, Jefferson is at Caldwell at 1 p.m., USciences is at Nyack at 1 p.m., and Holy Family is at Dominican at 1 p.m.

Lincoln on Saturday, hosts Shaw in a CIAA game at 2 p.m., while on the other side of the river in the New Jersey Athletic Conference, Rowan hosts Ramapo College at 3 p.m. in Glassboro while TCNJ, which just upset Rowan to tie for first, will host Montclair State at 1 p.m. in Ewing just above Trenton. 

And that’s the report.