The Guru’s Postseason WBIT Tourney Report: Burke’s Shot Brings Win and Ecstasy to Villanova and Agony to Saint Joseph’s in Round Two

Updated with tip times - nova at 7 p.m.

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

PHILADELPHIA — In recent confrontations over the last two seasons, the long running Holy War on the women’s side of the two Big Five schools located just a few miles apart between the Main Line campus of the Wildcats and the Hawks’ home here just inside the city limits has been quite holy in ambience but a lot less in war.

Saint Joseph’s ended a long-running losing streak here in Hagan Arena last season by a decided margin on the way to a 4-0 sweep and the Big Five title under the old format.

Several months later by virtue of the NCAA-newly launched WBIT, the equivalent of the men’s NIT, the two met up the road at Finneran Pavilion in the Elite Eight round to send the winner on to the Final Four at Butler’s Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis and Villanova got its revenge decidedly to move on and beat Penn State before losing to Illinois in the championship.

Coming into this season, Villanova had been decimated in the portal while the Hawks were one of the few to remain totally intact in terms of ship jumpers though Wildcats coach Denise Dillion pulled in respectable talent including freshman point guard Jasmine Bascoe who had international experience in her native Canada out of Toronto.

And they still had Maddie Burke, the Doylestown native and former Central Bucks West star who transferred from Penn State back home for the 2022-23 season.  

However, with Bascoe at her best under the new Big Five Classic tournament format, Villanova came here to Hagan last December and blasted the heavily favored Hawks to earn the championship match won by Temple.

But as it evolved the two were not done with each other for the year.

Villanova, off a struggle in early season while figuring the blend of a new roster that lessened the profile, and Saint Joseph’s, being one of the first four to just miss the NCAA field, were back in the WBIT and after the Hawks romped here over UAlbany in Round One and the Wildcats at home rallied on Boston College, they were reunited Sunday afternoon once more.

This time, however, it was war in front of a large and energetic crowd with a game worthy of the series providing the kind of ambience that would draw high marks with the WNBA honchos considering whether Philadelphia should emerge from a large group of seekers pursuing to be the next expansion city.

Back and forth it went, the Hawks to a quick start, the Wildcats to counter, until the home crowd began drawing comfort when Laura Ziegler scored inside for a 58-52 lead with 2:16 left in regulation.

Then Bascoe struck from deep to slice it to 58-55 but Mackenzie Smith, the threat of her collegiate career ending, got two right back to make it 60-55 with 1:32 left.

Then Maddie Webber hit a three-ball for the visitors with 38 seconds left after Ziegler stole it, but she got it back off the Hawks’ Emma Boslet.

“Webber was struggling and her hitting that three was what gave us that opportunity,” Dillon said. “We talked about needing to get a stop and coming up with a steal, we said, `we’re going, we’re not using the timeout, we’re going.’

“I feel it’s our best offense when we’re in the open court and it’s ‘Webb and Jas finding theirr teammates. Burke had made a shot earlier, Jas found her as the open person and Burke just made a huge shot.”

On the next possession Webber stole it off Smith with 11 seconds left and fed into the game’s defining moment of agony and ecstasy finding Burke to launch Villanova’s 11th 3-pointer of the game and a 61-60 lead with .04 left.

“Any opportunity to keep playing,” Burke said of her game-winner. “I will and if I get the opportunity to shoot, I’m going and every time, I think it’s going in. I just let it fly.”

Talya Bruglar, another of the star seniors, then lost possession before a desperation attempt could be made and Kaitlyn Orihel went 1-2 from the line for the game’s final point off an experimental indirect technical being applied for the tournament.

“Oh my gosh, what a game!, “Dillon said. “Extremely proud of our group for just sticking it out to the very end against a great Saint Joe’s team, who is leaving it all out on the line as well. I’m trying to process this. How proud I am of our group for playing the final stretch and Maddie Burke coming up with the big shot at the end.“

Though Villanova (20-14) was a 4-seed in this quad, on a day this tournament had a lot of upsets and close scores, the Wildcats gained a bonus up in North Jersey where unseeded Portland (31-4), regular season co-champion of the West Coast Conference, nipped ‘Nova’s Big East rival and 3-seed Seton Hall 61-55, enabling the Dillon’s squad to host the Pilots Thursday night, 7 p.m.

In the opener, Portland upset Stanford, the second seed, who joined the ACC this season after the collapse of the PAC-12, but struggled after the retirement of legend Tara VanDerveer and missed the NCAA tournament for the first time in over three decades after losing several talented players who transferred out or graduated.

Bascoe scored 15, including 3-9 from deep, and Burke had 11, including six in the last period.

While Villanova was its traditional self firing threes, Saint Joseph’s (24-10) was 1-10.

Bruglar, also playing her last game, scored 18 while junior Laura Ziegler had another double double with 19 points and 10 rebounds.

Smith scored 13.

Using a size advantage the Hawks outscored the opposition 40-20 in the paint.

It had been a roller-coaster month for the Hawks, who were in and out of the NCAA bubble for weeks from bracket analysts.

A year ago in the Atlantic 10 tourney, they got bounced early from Rhode Island, and this time around they slipped past the Rams in the quarterfinals and then Ziegler hit a shot in the semifinals at the buzzer to down top-seeded Richmond, only to be handled in the championship by a George Mason team they beat twice.

“Certainly not the way we wanted this game to go,” said Saint Joseph’s veteran coach Cindy Griffin, who like Dillon, is guiding her alma mater.

Griffin has been at it since 2001-02 while Dillon, who had spent a long time coaching Drexel, returned cross town in 2020 to fill the vacancy her Harry Perretta retired from a long career.

“I thought the last minute and a half, I take full responsibility for all of it,” Griffin said. “I thought there were some situations where we could have done a lot better, and it’s just one of those situations that if we could get it back, we would get it back, but this time of year you can’t get it back.

“A couple plays you have to give Villanova credit, two threes in the last 45 seconds. They made those plays. Doesn’t take away from the year that we’ve had and the team’s accomplishment and also the way this tam has showed up every day,” she continued.

“This time of year, you want to coach kids that want to be coached, and you want to coach players that want to play, and this team never wavered. We come off a really tough situations, losing the (A-10) championship game a couple of weeks ago, and we get disappointed there, we get disappointed not making the NCAA Tournament.

“We get a No. 1 seed in this tournament which is a really great tournament and as a coach you’re always like ‘I hope we’re ready to play,’ and this team, I never had to worry about whether they’re ready to play or not.”

This one is going to sting a bit for the Hawks with the end of the core group that brought the program back to better days.

“They have really put their footprint on this program,” Griffin said. “From a culture standpoint, from every-day players that they come in every day with no agenda. Their work effort is off the charts.

“They came in, they won 13 games their freshman year, they went to 20 their sophomore year, 28 games last year, 24 games this year. One step further they got to championship game, it wasn’t obviously the outcome we wanted but they kept getting this program further and further. I’ll be forever grateful and then you add Laura to that mix, and it just elevated our whole program from a skill standpoint. I will be forever indebted to them.”

In the other three WBIT quads on Thursday resulting from the second round, 1-seed James Madison (30-5), who beat Villanova during the season, at 7 p.m. will host 3-seed Belmont (24-12), the Duchesses beat Marquette 80-76 at home in overtime, while Belmont beat Northern Arizona 81-80.

In Sector Three Texas Tech (19-17), a 69-59 winner at 1-seed Virginia Tech, at 6 p.m. visits 3-seed Florida (19-17), which ousted 2-seed UNLV (26-8) 86-84.

In Sector Four Gonzaga (24-10), which tied Portland for first in the WCC, won 64-55 at top-seed Colorado, at 8 p.m. will be at 2-seed Minnesota (22-11), which beat Missouri State 78-71. 

All games are airing on ESPN+ this round, the semifinals are on ESPNU, the title game on ESPN+.