The Guru Report: Saint Joseph’s Snaps Drexel Losing Streak While Villanova Bounces Back; Chaos Nationally Including Big East

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

PHILADELPHIA - Saint Joseph’s blasting away to a near historic season start finally got the Dragons off the Hawks’ backs Sunday afternoon with a 69-49 win at home in Hagan Arena snapping a five-game Philly Six losing streak to nearby Drexel and also going back in front with a 6-5 lead in the local series.

At 8-0 among not many unbeaten teams left in the nation at the end of the first week of December it’s the best start in alumna Cindy Griffin’s 22-year coaching career at her alma mater and just short of the program record 10-0 mark achieved under her former coach Jim Foster in 1984-85 three years before she became one of his recruits.

Going into Sunday a year after another struggling start caused by injuries, effects of the pandemic and a youthful but talented roster the 7-0 mark tied the 2004-05 start under Griffin and now is a four-decade old achievement.

“This was a really big win, especially for me, we haven’t beaten Drexel since l’ve been here,” said Katie Jekot, who is a sixth-year senior who joined the 1,000 career-point club earlier this week. “But just super excited to be 8-0, and this is a great team to do it with.’

At 2-0 in the Big Five having topped Penn and Temple. arch-rival Villanova lies ahead Saturday up the road after Wednesday’s visit to the north to Rider at Alumni Gym at 7 p.m. on the ESPN family of networks in Lawrenceville, N.J.

While the squad itself is focused on one game at a time Hawks fans can look at the Atlantic 10 start on New Year’s Eve visiting La Salle in the final City Series game of the season and see a not far-fetched dream right now of a potential string of conference successes landing on the door step of defending conference champion UMass in mid-January.

That roster finally did bloom with four newcomers making the all A-10 frosh squad, including frosh of year Talya Brugler, a deep run in the conference tourney and a forecast of sixth heading into this season with the addition of freshman Laura Ziegler. 

“Ithink for this team in particular, it was important, just because we have so  much youth still on our roster … to get off to a really good start and get the confidence,” Griffin said on a day that began with a reception for season ticket holders. “So I think we’re still building that, we’re obviously very, very happy with where we are, but we still have some work to do, and we’ll be ready for whatever challenge comes our way.”

Griffin recently gained her 400th career victory that included a start at Loyola, Md., before returning to Hawk Hill where she is now the dean of local Division I women’s coaches in the wake of Harry Perretta’s retirement at Villanova several season’s ago.

In winning over Drexel (5-2), albeit finding itself shorthanded with newcomer Kylie Lavelle (18.6 ppg.) sidelined with a lower body injury, termed “day-to-day,” Saint Joseph’s topped a squad that had become one of the city’s best as well as in the Colonial Athletic Association.

Keishana Washington, one of the nation’s scoring leaders, got her points, collecting 28, but it took 27 shots while the rest of the Dragons’ fire was extinguished.

“I told the players in the locker room that they executed the game plan, both offensively and defensively,” Griffin said.

“They have someone at every spot who’s efficient in what they do,” said Drexel coach Amy Mallon, who played a year on Hawk Hill after transferring from Richmond. 

Mackenzie Smith scored 17 points for the Hawks, cited by Griffin, “someone who is important to what we do and doesn’t get talked about nearly enough at these (postgame press conferences).”

Brugler had 15 points and 11 rebounds, while Ziegler scored 10.

Villanova Handles Providence: The No. 25 Wildcats (7-2, 1-1 Big East)  who may stay in the next poll released Monday due to a large wave of upsets, recovered from Friday’s Big East opening loss at home to No. 13 Creighton, evening the conference record with a 79-54 win at Providence in Rhode Island, got 29 points from Maddy Siegrist and nine rebounds over the Friars (6-4, 0-2).

Lucy Olsen had 14 points and dealt six assists while Bella Runyon scored 10 with five assists.

Janai Crooms, the only Friar in double figures, had a double-double 16 points and 10 rebounds.

Prior to the weekend’s visit from Saint Joseph’s ‘Nova will host American University Tuesday at 7 p.m. on Flohoops.

Rutgers Felled by No. 4 Ohio State: On a day retired Hall of Fame coach C. Vivian Stringer was honored with her name on the court at Jersey Mike’s Arena in Piscataway, N.J., the Scarlet Knights in their Big Ten opener fought back from a 30-10 deficit to make their loss respectable at 82-70 to the powerful Buckeyes (8-0, 1-0 Big Ten).

Kaylene Smikle had 21 points off the bench for Rutgers (4-6, 0-1), while Kassondra Brown scored 15, Kai Carter scored 11 with six rebounds and five assists, while Awa Sidibe scored 10.

Ohio State got 31 points from Rebeka Mikulasikova and 30 from Taylor Mikesell.

The Scarlet Knights continue in conference play, traveling to Illinois Wednesday at 8 p.m., returning Saturday to host Hampton.

Delaware Downed By Duquesne: A fourth quarter rally fell short and the Blue Hens finished their brief home stand losing to Duquesne 66-55 at the Bob Carpenter Center in Newark.

Trailing 58-52 Delaware (5-3) launched a 5-0 run but the Dukes (6-2) recovered and finished on a 7-3 spurt.

“I don’t think we played as hard as we have in previous games,” said first-year coach Sarah Jenkins. “We are a young group that have had some success early and we need to regroup as we head into our game with Princeton next Sunday.”

Makayla Pippin scored 10 and grabbed nine rebounds for Delaware while Jewel Smalls and Tara Cousins each scored nine. Additionally, Smalls had nine rebounds while Cousins had four assists and three steals.

Duquesne got 17 points each from Tess Myers and Precious Johnson, who also grabbed eight rebounds. Naelle Bernard had 14 points while Megan McConnell triple-doubled her way to 10 points, 15 rebounds, and 10 assists,

Nationally noted: It was a wild Sunday and with losses on the weekend by Texas and Louisville, already holding low rankings, that if bounced it will be just the second time, the other being the first-ever ranking in November, 1976, that neither of the duo, along with Tennessee, ejected last week, that none of the trio appears at least once, a string over 800 weeks in rankings history.

On Monday Stanford’s Tara VanDerveer will become No. 1 in ranking appearances by a coach at 619, breaking a one-week tie with the late Tennessee legend Pat Summitt who was at 618 when she retired, missing just 14 in what was the AP Women’s Poll history at that moment. 

On Sunday, VanDerveer’s Division I women’s win record moved up to 1167 off the the 84-63 triumph over No. 23 Gonzaga by the No. 2 Cardinal (10-1) at home in Maples Pavilion. 

Reserve Brooke Demetre had 17 points, making five shots from deep for Stanford, while Cameron Brink and Hannah Jump each scored 14 points and Brink double-doubled with 16 rebounds over the Zags (7-2), who got 22 points from Kayly Truong and 19 from Brynna Maxwell.

Unable to keep pace staying at 1155 in the runnersup spot was No. 3 UConn coach Geno Auriemma, whose Huskies suffered a 74-60 loss at No. 7 Notre Dame, which had previously lost at the finish to No. 20 Maryland.

In being handed its first season loss, UConn (6-1) got 21 points from Lou Lopez-Senechal, 14 from Aaliyah Edwards, and 11 from Nika Muhl. In just 13 minutes having bern injured Azzi Fudd was scoreless, taking just two shots.

Notre Dame (7-1) got 21 points from Olivia Miles, 17 and nine rebounds from Maddy Westbeld, 12 from Lauren Ebo, and Sonia Citron and Dara Mabrey each scored 10.

Two others of the four Big East ranked teams were also upset Sunday following the fourth Villanova losing Friday night at home to No. 13 Creighton.

The Bluejays (7-1, 1-1 Big East) then suffered their first loss on Sunday, falling at St. John’s 66-62 on Long Island.

The host Red Storm (8-0, 2-0 ) got 20 points from Jayla Everett, 13 each from Kadaja Bailey and Unique Drake, while Raven Peeples got nine points and 11 rebounds.

Creighton’s Lauren Jensen scored 21 and Morgan Maly scored 15 points.

No. 24 Marquette ( 7-2, 1-1) fell at Seton Hall 82-78 in Walsh Gym in South Orange, N.J. as the host Pirates (6-3, 2-0) got 31 points from Lauren Park-Lane and 23 from Sidney Cooks.

Chloe Marotta scored 30 and grabbed 12 rebounds for the Golen Eagles.

No. 18 Louisville, who ended a 98-straight weeks of appearances in the AP Poll Top 10 got handled at Middle Tennessee 67-49  in Murfreesboro as the host C-USA favorites (5-2) got 23 points from Savannah Wheeler, 16 points and 10 rebounds from Courtney Whitson, and 15 from Kseniya Malashka. 

Hailey Van Lith had 12 points and 10 rebounds for the Cardinals (5-4).

Tennessee back to being unranked rallied but got nipped at home in Knoxville by No. 9 Virginia Tech 59-56 as Kayana Traylor scored 18 for the winning Hokies (8-0) while Jordan Horston had 26 points and 11 rebounds for the Volls (4-5).

In the Big Ten, No. 20 Maryland coach Brenda Frese was denied her 600th victory as the Terrapins followed the Notre Dame win losing at home in the XFINITY Center in College Park to Nebraska 90-67.

Jaz Shelly had 29 points for the Cornhuskers (6-3, 1-0) while Allison Weidner had 13 points and 15 rebounds. Shyanne Sellers had 21 points and eight rebounds for Maryland (7-3).

No. 5 Indiana (9-0, 1-0) escaped 65-61 at the hands of visiting Illinois (7-2, 0-1), Mackenzie Holmes scoring 23 for the Hoosiers and Makira Cook scored 33 for the Illini.

Caitlin Clark had 22 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists setting a Big Ten record with her seventh triple double for No. 10 Iowa (6-3, 1-0) in a 102-71 trouncing at Wisconsin (3-7, 0-1), while No. 17 Michigan (9-0, 1-0) at home in Ann Arbor got 17 points from Jillian Brown leading three others in double figures as the Wolverines rang up a 77-66 win on Northwestern (4-4, 0-1).

Looking Ahead: Temple hosts La Salle at 7 Monday night on ESPN+, each looking for their first Big Five win while Princeton is at Towson at 7 on Flohoops. On Tuesday, both at 7, Penn hosts Bucknell on ESPN+ while Villanova hosts American on Flohoops.

And that’s the report.