By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru
VILLANOVA – Historically, the opening night results of the Villanova women’s basketball season under the longtime guidance of coach Harry Perretta have varied over his four decades as indicators to what lies ahead the next several months.
There have been nights the Wildcats looked like a superpower and went on to make those performances stand up all the way to berths in the NCAA or at worst the WNIT tournaments.
And there have been other games where the previous 40 minutes have been a misread but that had not become apparent until ‘Nova got deep into the Big East schedule.
Likewise, especially with a young and inexperienced group, a Game 1 losing mismatch indicated a long season ahead, which became true, but, again, other moments have proved it was only a misread and by the time conference play arrived, Perretta had everything under control.
With Villanova hosting George Washington here on the Main Line at home in Finneran Pavilion Wednesday night (the only D-1 local game on the slate, by the way), the ‘Cats’ opposition, a traditional force in the Atlantic 10, provided a good test to gauge the state of things at the 2019-20 outset with the Wildcats.
Unfortunately, here, the answer came quickly: Not very good at the moment with the final score 68-56 advantage Colonials.
For one, gone from last season in terms of active duty is leading scorer Kelly Jekot, who is sitting out rehabbing a knee injury, while Emily Esposito, a promising redshirt freshman who made contributions at the finish of ‘Nova’s 19-13 record last spring, has transferred to Boston U.
Furthermore, three seniors have departed in three-ball shooting ace Adrianna Hahn, inside force Jannah Tucker, and reliable Grace Stant.
Though Mary Gedaka and Bridget Herlihy are back with veteran experience, by midway Wednesday through the second quarter when the Colonials took off on a 13-2 run to the end of the half, it was apparent that the early signs are showing it to be one of those years.
Perretta noted a reversal from a season ago when the Wildcats had an easy win playing the Colonials in the nation’s capital.
“We had the experience and they had a bunch of people out with injuries who were sitting on the bench,” he said.
On Wednesday, George Washington, coached by former UConn star Jen Rizzotti, went on to lead by as much 22 points with 8 minutes, 22 seconds left in the game.
Sydney Zambrotta led the Colonials, scoring 17 points, while Alexandra Maund scored 12, and Tori Hyduke scored 10.
The Herlihy sisters, Bridget and Brianna, each scored 12 points for the Wildcats while they were topped by redshirt freshman teammate Madison Siegrist, who scored 14 points off the bench and grabbed a game-high nine rebounds.
Acclaimed freshman Mackenzie Gardler, the daughter of former Saint Joseph’s star Katie Gardler, from Cardinal O’Hara who sat out her true freshman season, made her debut and was scoreless off two shots in 11 minutes, 37 seconds off the bench.
So what’s ahead?
For the most part, after the Wildcats fell to 31-20 in season openers, Perretta was in a “time will tell” mode, saying that his young squad will have to keep playing to get experience to do the right things in the system.
However, right off his first sentence, this was a night unlike the 50 that have come before, including the 41 starts under the veteran mentor.
“Like I told Mark (Jackson), our AD, It’s better that it’s me than whoever the new coach is going to be. It’ll drive them into a wall.”
One week ago, Perretta made the public announcement that his 42nd season will be his last, tying an existing NCAA record for all Divisions in working them all at one university in women’s basketball under the national organization.
Thus, Wednesday was the first date since the release went out, to be around him.
That situation put us into a formal postgame press conference format rather than we usually grab him most times by the team bench after the cool-down period expires.
Naturally, after the niceties of the game itself as noted above were addressed, the questions turned to his departure, which now has his last opening night contest in the record books.
As for what is the effect of making the announcement now rather than later, Perretta said, “I think the pros are, the kids know what’s going on. You don’t dump it on them at the end of the year.
“They know they have time to absorb. That’s one of the pros. The other is, `Hey, we know at the end of the year there’s going to be a change.’
“Like I said, I told Mark, this team was going to be an inexperienced team and they were going to struggle, and I was kind of happy that I would be the one to take the lumps with them.
“You don’t want to bring someone else in and have them have to experience all that. It’s better that person who has been here 42 years takes that.
“It helps the program. It helps whoever is coming in. The recruits know what’s going on. The three recruits committed to Villanova, they’re still coming, which I think is good.
“And I had told the three recruits when we went to their homes that I would not be here for their four years.
“I didn’t know at what point I wouldn’t be here. But they knew I wouldn’t be here.
“All of them had other offers and I just felt that I was as honest as I could be with them from the beginning. I think getting it out there, ‘Hey, I wasn’t going to be here, it’s just a little sooner.’
“From my mindset it helps me a little bit because at least I know what’s happening.
“I know now my job is to make this group as best as I can, to be as best as they can be toward the end of the year to get them ready for the future. So, I’ll put all my energy into that.
Perretta said he came to finality of the decision at the end of them summer, “When I had trouble walking. I have arthritis in both knees. I have some other medical issues going on. I just felt like I couldn’t maintain this pace anymore, but we talked.”
He talked with athletic officials at the university that he was close with and they wanted him to wait until a certain date to go public and Perretta didn’t want the news to become a distraction when it would break from other things that had already been scheduled.
“It finally just caught up to me.”
Of course, with the public now aware, especially the program fanbase, that the time had come, it was clear from those who brought the subject up during Wednesday’s game, they indicated the popular choice here is Drexel coach Denise Dillon, a former Villanova star who has built the Dragons into an annual contender in the Colonial Athletic Association.
Associate head coach Joe Mullaney Jr., who formerly was a head coach at Providence and St. John’s before joining Perretta for what has now been 24 seasons and has been the nuts and bolts operator behind the scenes, smiled, and said, “I’m not retiring. I’m going to be around somewhere, if not here.
“I’m going to just let things play out,” he said, not giving any definitive indication that he would pursue the position. “I’m sure there are going to be a lot of great candidates.”
Meanwhile, in terms of back to the squad getting more seasoning, the non-conference schedule heading to the Big East portion is going to provide that, continuing here Saturday night when James Madison, the favorite in the CAA, visits.
Then the opposition order will be at American (11-14), where head coach Megan Gebbia, a former 10-year assistant at Marist, is one of the newer breed of coaches whose same comes up at prominent openings; at Fordham (11-17); Manhattan here (11-21); at Georgia (11-24); circle this date-at Drexel (12-4); Saint Joseph’s here (12-7); at Temple (12-10) and at La Salle (12-21) with the remaining non-conference game hosting Penn (Jan. 15).
Looking Ahead: The Guru will be at the Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame but Saint Joseph’s visits Columbia Thursday night in the only contest on the 11-team D-1 local slate; On Friday, Duquesne visits Temple in McGonigle Hall while Delaware hosts America East favorite Maine.
On Saturday, Penn opens at The Palestra, hosting Siena at noon; Drexel hosts Davidson in a first-round WNIT game at 2 p.m. and there’s the JMU game here at night. La Salle hosts Robert Morris at noon while Rutgers hosts Coppin State at 2 p.m.
George Washington will be hosting Princeton Sunday with the Tigers coming in the wake of their lopsided Tuesday win over Rider.
The Broncs, trying to bounce back, will be at Penn State, the same day. The Lady Lions are coming off the Tuesday opening win at Towson.
That’s it.
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