The Guru Report: Villanova Upset Adds to Peretta Celebration

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

VILLANOVA, Pa. – Back in November, the women’s hoops world in general found it unbelievable that longtime Villanova coach Harry Perretta, per his announcement, was going to retire at the end of this, his 42^nd season on the Main Line, all at Villanova.

“It’s like you always thought Santa Claus was going to be there,” said Fordham coach Stephanie Gaitley, one of his former star players, in a YouTube posting this past week on the Guru’s Facebook and twitter accounts produced by our New York correspondent Andy Lipton. “Well, you always believed Harry was going to be coaching Villanova.”

Well the shoe was on the other foot again here Sunday afternoon in the Wildcats’ Finneran Pavilion that served as the site for the regularly scheduled Big East mega-attraction playing No. 12 DePaul, which clinched the conference tournament top seed Friday night at Georgetown before heading up here to complete the Blue Demons’ weekend swing in the East.

The game, being the last scheduled home contest with one weekend left on the road, also became the annual salute to the departing seniors, this time those being honored were Mary Gedaka, whose mom Lisa Angelotti was a Big East player of the year out of here; Bridget Herlihy, Cameron Onken, and manager Jimmie Davis.

And because it was what it was as the schedule has rolled the last four months that also served as the farewell tour with gifts to Perretta from opposing teams at each stop along the way, this would serve as the hometown official salute being his last regularly scheduled game on the sidelines here on the same court shared by the recent two-time NCAA champion men’s team under Jay Wright.

And so has occurred with the “unbelievable” react, so again was another in a series of “unbelievable” reacts from Perretta to the final score Sunday having seen his Wildcats control DePaul and spring a 76-58 upset following another one on Friday night when Villanova beat Marquette here.

The ‘Cats are the first to sweep the Demons and Golden Eagles in a weekend since 2015.

It was the perfect culmination turnaround from an 0-3 start in November when Perretta, the Dean of the Big East women’s (and men’s) coaches was taking deep breathes while predicting it would take until late December before his youthful roster could perform consistently off his system.

As the team began to do “unbelievable” good things for him, the humorous postgame comments off his affable personality began to flow.

“The weekend of the two miracles,” he proclaimed as the bus got back here to campus after a road sweep at Seton Hall and Saint John’s. “Never would I have believed we would win two games up there.”

And after beating Penn here last month for a share of the Big Five title with Temple, “that’s unbelievable considering what probably would have happened if we played them earlier.”

That game, by the way, began with Penn coach Mike McLaughlin presenting him with an original piece of The Palestra floor.

“I think I’m going to bed with this,” he grinned showing it off to a small media group after the game.

Then there was an upset again of St. John’s, this time down here in a closely fought game decided at the end.

“I could have bet a million dollars, a million, that we would not sweep them,” came the reaction.

On Friday came the win over second-place Marquette.

“I spent all night watching film and they played unbelievably great,” said longtime DePaul coach Doug Bruno before the game of Villanova. He and Perretta combine for 1,500 wins in their careers.

And the game began with Nova taking an early lead and then holding it to make one think as many did that famed night in 2003 at the Big East championship when the ‘Cats upset UConn to also end what was then an NCAA-record 70-game win streak, “Might they win this.”

Wishful thinking began to transform into reality, also helped by the fact the Demons’ three-point shooting stayed behind in the capital or so it seemed with a 2-for-24 effort by DePaul (25-4, 15-2 Big East).

And as the seniors were given gifts pre-game, they so gave back during the next 40 minutes, with Onken joining former star Liad Suez-Karni with the second triple double in the program’s history with 12 points, 18 rebounds, and 10 assists while Gedaka had 17 points and 8 rebounds, and Herlihy defended well.

But the future also continued her brilliance in Maggie Siegrist, who had 29 points and 13 rebounds. 

Early in the game, the native of Poughkeepsie, N.Y., scored her 505^th point on the season to eclipse the the 36-year-old freshman record held by the fabled Shelly Pennefather.

Siegrist has already tied the Big East record with 10 frosh of the week awards equaling those held by former UConn great Maya Moore and Georgetown’s Natalie Butler, who later transferred to Connecticut and then once more to George Mason.

The performance by Siegrist for Villanova (16-11, 10-6) could put her in line to get No. 11 when this week’s recipients are announced late Monday morning. She now has a Big East-best11 double doubles and 14 games of 20 or more points.

On the other side, DePaul’s Chante Stonewall had 16 points and reserve Deebekelja scored 14.

By the way, plenty of the Guru’s colleagues have wrote their commentary on the day’s events worth reading but other then to give you the quip from this author to Perretta “I was here before you came and I’ll be here after you leave” aside from things written along the way and the day of the announcement, we are holding off until official end game since Sunday was adios but not goodbye.

Interesting things could still occur between now and then, beginning with the final games next weekend when Villanova finishes at Creighton in Omaha, Nebraska, Friday night, and at Providence in Rhode Island, Sunday.

Then the Big East tournament follows the next weekend in Chicago at DePaul’s Wintrust Arena. Villanova at the moment could finish with a top four seed.

And after that, if not the NCAA, it will be the WNIT, with Perretta back here for at least one more encore, if not several.

CAA: The Drexel Streak Continues But Delaware Falls

While Dragons coach Denise Dillon couldn’t be at Sunday’s festivities here as a former Wildcats star, she continued to impress with her own production down in West Philadelphia at Drexel’s Daskalakis Athletic Center.

Unlike Friday night’s thriller won by the Dragons over Williams & Mary in overtime, this one was under control quickly as Drexel rolled to a 66-47 win at home in a Colonial Athletic Association game over Elon (12-14, 7-8 CAA) to extend the current overall win streak to 13 straight games and maintain a one-game lead over James Madison.

Drexel (20-6, 13-1) will go for a sweep of JMU Friday night visiting the Dukes in Harrisonburg, Va.

As for the 20^th win, it’s Drexel’s fourth straight season reaching that number, nine overall, of which seven are under Dillon, and it’s the fifth in the last six.

The run of 13 is third in program history behind two streaks of 16, one of which came under Dillon in 2009 when Drexel won the CAA and advanced to the NCAA tournament.

On Sunday, the defense was at it again, this time forcing 25 miscues to prevail 30-12 in points off turnovers.

Keishana Washington had a game-high 16 points, while Mariah Leonard had a career-high 15 points, and Bailey Greenberg scored 12 for Drexel, which is now 598-517 in its 38-season history.

Aubree Brown had game highs of seven rebounds and seven assists, including her 500^th, joining two previous Dragons. She needs three rebounds to become the first in Drexel history to have 500 points, rebounds, and assists.

Meanwhile, Delaware, the other Guru local CAA team, caught a William & Mary squad looking to recover from Friday’s loss and the Tribe took advantage to down the Blue Hens 78-60 at the Bob Carpenter Center in Newark to complete its road trip.

Jasmine Dickey had 17 points and 10 rebounds, while Nicole Enabosi reached her 49^th double double in her career with 13 points and 12 rebounds for Delaware (10-15, 6-8 CAA). She also has 1,054 career rebounds, 10^th best in CAA history, and ten short of Danielle Parker’s 1,064 Blue Hens record set in 2008-13.

The visiting Tribe are now 19-7 overall and 10-5 in the CAA in third place, two games behind JMU and three behind Drexel.

Delaware travels to Towson Friday night and JMU Sunday.

MAAC: Rider Uses Fourth Quarter Attack to Down Iona

Only four of the 11 Guru local Division I teams played Sunday, since seven were in action Saturday, and the fourth, Rider, used a 14-2 run in the fourth quarter to pull away and beat Iona 53-41 at home in Alumni Gymnasium in Lawrenceville, N.J., enabling the Broncs (21-4, 14-2 MAAC) to move back into an exact tie with preseason favorite Marist in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.

Fairfield, meanwhile, is now third, three games behind the leaders but if Rider wins at Fairfield Thursday, its next game, which is in Connecticut, it would own the first-place tiebreak if that’s how both teams finish. Marist split with the Stags.

The MAAC tourney after a long stay in Albany, N.Y., moves next month to Atlantic City’s Boardwalk Hall.

In snapping a two-game win streak by Iona (8-16, 7-8), the Gaels got outscored 13-11 by Rider’s Stella Johnson in the third period.

Amanda Mobley had 16 points for the Broncs, while Stella Johnson, the nation’s leading scorer, had 15. She is now the only active player in NCAA Division I with 2,000 career points, 700 career rebounds, 400 career assists, and 300 career steals. Amari Johnson grabbed 12 rebounds.

Nationally Noted: Upset Sunday As Seven Ranked Teams Fall to Unranked Ones

Besides the Villanova win over No. 12 DePaul, other upsets Sunday saw Alabama win at No. 9 Mississippi State 66-64 and Florida at home edged No. 22 Arkansas 83-80 in the SEC, Colorado top visiting No. 11 Arizona 50-38 in the PAC-12, while also in the conference, Utah at home topped No. 21 Arizona State 75-71, and also in the PAC-12, Washington at  home beat No. 8 UCLA 74-68. In the ACC, Georgia Tech at home edged No. 17 Florida State, 65-62.

Looking to Monday, when no Guru teams are scheduled, the big game of the night has No. 3 Oregon visiting No. 4 Stanford in the PAC-12.

And that’s the report.