PHILADELPHIA– It was ironic. Villanova chose yesterday to celebrate the return of valuable guard Justin Moore, who suffered a torn Achilles tendon last March in the NCAA region final, missed the Final Four, and sat out until the Cats’ Big East game against Providence at Wells Fargo.
But two former Big 5 players– Ed Croswell and guard Jared Bynum– spoiled his return.
Crosswell, a 6-8 transfer from La Salle, scored 14 points on 7 of 9 shooting while Bynum, the former St Joseph’s Hawk who transferred before the start of last season, came off the bench to score 17 of his 19 points in the final 10:38 as the 21st ranked Friars (17-5, 9-2) defeated the Cats, 70-65, before a surprisingly large crowd of 15,503 at Wells Fargo Center.
Bynum made three huge threes and took the game over after the Friars had fallen behind 49-45. Bynum shot 7 for 9 and finished with 5 assists as the Friars came to life down Friars the stretch, outscoring the Cats 15-8 over the final 7:58 to push perennial conference contender Villanova back under .500 at 10-11 and an uncharacteristic 4-6 in league play.
The game was played at 12 noon and ended about an hour before the Philadelphia Eagles hosted the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship game across the street at Lincoln Financial Field. There were some Eagles’ chants and plenty of green jerseys throughout the arena.
“It shows our guys are resilient and can compete when we’re not at our best,” Providence coach Ed Cooley said. “I thought it was an incredible team win. It was a character win. It was a physical culture win.’’
Cam Whitmore scored 21 points and grabbed nine rebounds for Villanova, which returned to the court after an eight-day layoff.
But the Cats had no answers for Bynum.
“He showed a lot of emotional maturity, mental maturity,” Cooley said. “Was able to gut out through the little bit of pain he was in. That was a person who willed his team.”
Bynum was playing his second game after missing four with an abdominal strain. But he came up huge, time and time again against Villanova, none bigger than after Cam Whitmore drained a three to pull Villanova within 66-65 with 132 to play. Bynum converted a turnaround, step back jumper off one foot to expand the lead to 68-65 with 24.7 seconds to play, Then, after a Villanova turnover, he closed out the game with a pair of free throws.
“It’s not a shot I normally take, but we practice those shots for moments like that,” Bynum said. “It came in handy.
”I’ve been in situations like that my whole life.”
Bynum said he wasn’t 100 percent. “I couldn’t put a percentage on it. I’m just getting my conditioning back, doing some extra running.”
Cooley, whose team won the Big East regular season title last season, has put together back to back top 25 teams with the resourceful use of the transfer portal that has produced forward Bryce Hopkins from Kentucky, who is one of the front runners for Big East Player of the Year honors.
Villanova to control those awards. But the Cats are no longer the best team in a league that has four nationally ranked teams– Marquette, Xavier, UConn and the Friars– and a fifth, Creighton, that could win the Big East tournament now that 7-0 Ryan Kalkbrenner is back.
“I give Providence a lot of credit,” Villanova first year coach Kyle Neptune said. “Down the stretch they just made more plays than we did. They were a little tougher than we were and came out with the win.”
Getting the 6-4 Moore, who missed the first 20 games of the season, should make the Cats more competitive. Moore could eventually be a game changer if he and Caleb Daniels learn to function effectively in the same backcourt. but for now, he is still finding his footing. Moore started and the crowd went wild when he scored on a layup three minutes into the game. Moore finished 5 points on 2 for 8 shooting. He had four rebounds and four assists in an active 31 minutes,
Moore decided to come back this season after resuming practice Christmas night. “I knew we had a long break coming up and I could really prepare myself for coming back.” he said.
”I felt good. Of course, I haven’t played a game in 10 months, So I must get back in rhythm. It was great to be out there with the guys competing again.”.
Neptune will take all the help he can get. The Cats have a healthy starting five for the first time this season and blue-chip freshman forward Cam Whitmore, who missed the start of the season with a thumb injury, is showing flashes of becoming an NBA lottery pick. But Nova doesn’t make threes like they have in the past, lack a true rim protector and struggle to make enough defensive stops to close out games.
I’m sure it hasn’t been easy for Neptune, who is learning on the job in one of the toughest leagues in the country, trying to deal with injuries and substiution patterns. .
And the road doesn’t get any easier. Nova’s next two games are trips to 16th-ranked Marquette and Creighton, which rarely loses in Omaha,
Unless the Cats can put together a huge run, this looks like it will be the first time since 2012 the Cats missed out of the NCAA tournament. Worse yet, it could be the first time the Cats have had a losing record since that forgettable season.
