HOUSTON– Villanova has not taken a traditional path to Monday night’s NCAA tournament championship game against ACC blue blood North Carolina here at monstrous 71,000-seat Stadium.

There are no NBA first round draft picks on this Big East team and no one and dones on this roster. This is not Kentucky or Duke. Freshman forward Mikal Bridges should eventually play in the league as should junior guard Josh Hart. Freshman point guard Jalen Brunson, senior center Daniel Ochefu and senior guard Ryan Arcidiacono all have a chance. But this Philadelphia Main Line university has never been strictly an assembly line to the pros.

It has been more of a program for solid Top 50 Division I prospects with high basketball IQs who improve through individual development playing for Jay Wright and earn their degrees in four years. .
Villanova is a throwback to a different era where team wasn’t spelled with an “I.”

The Cats have been a constant participant in the NCAA tournament and an occasional visitor to the Elite Eight and the Final Four. This is one year where they are not just happy to be there.

The Cats offered us a preview of what could happen when they lit up Oklahoma, 95-51, in a lopsided national semi-final Saturday night, blowing away a team that had beaten them by 23 earlier in the season in a neutral site game at Pearl Harbor. Nova shot a blistering 71.4 percent, made 11 threes on the elevated stage and shut down the Big 12 Sooners defensively, limiting Naismith Player of the Year Buddy Hield to only nine points on 4 of 12 shooting by rotating multiple defenders onto the 6-3 All American guard.

“This program, this culture is about high-character guys,” Hart said. “A lot of guys that have been here love the family. I think that’s the reason why a lot of guys are able to stay around so long, because we genuinely love each other, we love the program, we love playing Villanova basketball. I don’t think it’s anything like Coach Wright has against anybody that could be a one-and-done. It’s nothing like that. We just recruit high-quality guys, guys who love the program, love the culture.”

“I just think to be able to play in this program, to even learn how to play Villanova basketball, it’s going to take you more than one year to play,” senior guard Ryan Arcidiacono added. “I would think Coach Wright has no problem taking a one-and-done guy as long as that kid knows how to play that type of basketball that we play on a daily basis. So I don’t think he has anything against those. I’m sure he would love to get guys like that. I think to be a part of this program, it takes a few years, a year or so, to get to know how to play hard and deal with all the little things, focus on everyone else instead of yourself.”

Wright needed to hear that. It was an affirmation of everything he has tried to convey to his players during his 15 years on this Philadelphia Main Line campus. “I was interested to hear what they say, too, because we don’t really talk about that,” he said. “But, yeah, we just want guys that want to be a part of Villanova University for life. If you’re good enough, if you come to Villanova because you want to be a part of it for life, you’re good enough to leave after a year and be a first-round pick, I’m all for it, all for it. I think Josh has a decision to make after this year. Jalen (Brunson) was coming in, everybody was talking about it. He was just concentrating on playing at Villanova. It doesn’t have anything to do with our recruiting whether you’re one-and-done or not. It’s just, ‘Do you want to be a part of the Villanova community and culture and this program?”’

Wright has taken this 34-5 program to new heights in the reinvented Big East by recruiting a specific type of player. “We are able to recruit quality people that allow you to coach them, that might not be the biggest names,” he said. “I mean, all these guys were top-50 players. You’re talking about big-name guys. Jalen may be the most hyped of all of them. Like, our school doesn’t get caught up in that. Our fans don’t get caught up in that. I know some guys have lost jobs because they haven’t gotten the top recruits in their area. The administration, appreciates the way we do it, that we want to get guys that fit our culture. They may not be the biggest names. I think these guys are some of the best players in the country, but they don’t get the hype as recruits. Villanova appreciates that, you know. And as long as you’re competing and graduating on time, all these guys graduate on time, that’s what Villanova cares about, that’s what I care about, so it just fits.”

The Cats are one step away from winning a national championship against a team that has knocked them out of the tournament three times en route to national championships in 1982, 2005 and 2009.

“I think the season started really where there wasn’t a dominant team,” Wright said. “I remember everybody saying about Carolina, If they play to their best, when they play their best, they’re great. Well, it’s hard to play your best. It’s a team sport. You got to spend time together, you got to work together. I’m sure that game against Northern Iowa made them a better team. I think you’re seeing a season where there weren’t dominant players, there weren’t dominant teams. Then you’re seeing a season where two teams just continued to get better and better and better and better. Now at the end, that’s what you’re seeing. The teams that continued to improve throughout the year and are playing the best right now. But neither of us were dominant during the season. I think you do see the two that are playing the best right now.”

Carolina, which won both the ACC regular season and the conference tournament, is here because the Tar Heels finally figured out of the riddle of Syracuse’s match up zone during 83-66 victory in their semi-final game. Carolina used its size to eventually impose its will on the Orange, outscoring the ‘Cuse in the paint, 50-32. They have inside trio in 6-10 Brice Johnson, 6-10, 250-pound Kennedy Meeks and 6-8 Justin Jackson who can hurt the Cats on the offensive glass much like Oklahoma did Saturday while limiting second shot opportunities and wearing 6-10 Daniel Ochefu out inside. They have the luxury of playing two point guards Joel Berry and Marcus Paige, who will make it more difficult for Nova to force them into turnovers.

Carolina is a slight two point favorite in this title game. But no one in this Final Four has shot the ball better from either the two or the three than Villanova and no one has played better at both ends of the court throughout the course of this tournament.

“Our goal is to be playing our best at the end of the year,’ Wright said. “Some years, the year we lost to NC State, I thought we were playing our best. At the end of the year we just ran into a hot team and didn’t make shots. But I do think that this team has taken advantage of the opportunity to continue to play games and has gotten better, even going into the Oklahoma game. I thought we had our best week of practice in terms of commitment to detail. We’re going to try this one more time and see if we can spend an hour and a half in there and get a little bit better. In that sense, it’s the best team we’ve ever had in terms of continuing to get better. I thought our ’09 Final Four team did that. I think this team is doing the same.”

Wright has a more polished personality than the often gruff Rollie Massimino, his former boss who coached Villanova to six perfect games during its unexpected national championship run in 1985 with a display of pure coaching brilliance. But he has learned how to become a great coach himself from his mentor and put himself in position to experience his own one shining moment.
His destiny will be revealed Monday night.