VILLANOVA, Pa.– The local college basketball world turned upside down Wednesday night on Philadelphia’s Main Line when St. Josephjs, a 15- point underdog, blasted 18th- ranked Villanova, 78-65, in the Big 5 Classic before a sellout crowd at the Finn.
It’s about time. St. Joe’s had not beaten Villanova in 11 years in a rivalry once known as the Holy War. The Hawks had not beaten the Cats on the road since the 2003 season. But this dominant win did wonders for the Hawks’ brand as it catapulted them into the 7 p.m. championship game of this six-team tournament featuring Nova, St. Joseph’s, Temple, Penn, La Salle and Drexel at the Wells Fargo Center. Villanova, which also lost to Big 5 rival Penn in a fifth-place game against Drexel at 2. With the Cats out of prime time, it is hard to tell how this inaugural triple header will draw, especially since lower lever seats are going for $150.
But it shouldn’t take away any of the luster from Billy Lange’s biggest victory in his four seasons on Hawk Hill.
“I grew up in Haddon Heights, NJ,” Lange said. “I went to the Palestra at a kid, coached at La Salle, Villanova and now St. Joe’s. I know how important this game is to the city and our school. We beat a great team out there. This will probably help St. Joseph’s people enjoy their Mack and Manco pizza a little more down at the Ocean City boardwalk this summer.
“We feel blessed to be a part of the championship game of this tournament.”
The Hawks will play Temple, which won a thrilling 106-98 triple overtime game against La Salle at the Liacouras Center in North Broad St in which Jameer Brickus of La Salle scored 41 points and five players from each team fouled out.
No one at Nova saw this coming. The 6-2 Wildcats played at a consistently high- level last week when they defeated Texas Tech, North Carolina and Memphis to win the three-day Battle4Atlantis in the Bahamas and St. Joseph’s was playing without its 7-0, 285 pound in center Christ Essandoko, who was out with a toe injury. .
But Kentucky coach John Calipari, whose Top 10 Cats narrowly escaped with overtime victory over the Hawks at Rupp, gave us a hint when he said he wouldn’t be surprised if the Hawks contended for the Atlantis 10 title after watching St. Joseph’s guard Erik Reynolds go off for 28 points and the Hawks come within a missed free throw with 13 seconds to play of pulling up a major shocker.
Reynolds, the 6-3 junior who can be a great shooter at times, had 24 points on 8 for 13 shooting with five threes against Nova. Freshman Point guard Xzayvier Brown, who played locally for Roman Catholic, finished with 16 points on 6 of 9 shooting with four threes himself and seemed unfazed by the hostile atmosphere. Brown, who had been coming off the bench, played 28 minutes when St. Joseph’s was forced to go small with their big man and showed he is destined to be a future Hawk great
But it was a decision fated to give St. Joseph’s an unexpected advantage because it gave the Hawks an additional shooter. The Hawks lit up the seemingly defenseless Wildcats, shooting 56.9 percent and making 14 of 27 threes. Two more players– Lynn Greer III, who scored 16 points on 7 for 10 shooting, and 6-9 sophomore forward Rasheer Fleming, who had 12 points and 11 rebounds, also played big roles for the Hawks.
The game brought back memories of the 1982 game between these two teams in which St. Joe’s, with Jeff Clark and Bryan Warrick, defeated an Elite 8 Villanova team with Eddie Pinckney and John Pinone by 20 in a Sunday city series night game at the Palestra.
, “Against a team like that, you just have to keep scoring,” Lange admitted.
“They found some matchups they liked and they made the most of them,” Villanova second-year coach Kyle Neptune said.
St. Joseph’s defeated Villanova the same way Penn did, stringing up a zone for long stretches that that turned into kryptonite for the Cats, who shot just 10 for 37 from beyond the arc and 38.6 percent. for the game. Lange claimed he went zone out of desperation to neutralize the matchup problems most teams have with senior center Eric Dixon and senior guard Justin Moore, two Big East stars. Dixon, who scored 34 points against North Carolina, only got off eight shots. “You have to determine where you want to put most of your energy.” Lange said.
But anyone who attended the Villanova-Penn game three weeks ago could see Steve Donahue used zone to force the Cats in a brutal 9-for33 three-point shooting night during a four- point victory.
Neptune had three weeks to develop an efficient zone offense, but he was reduced to constantly swinging the ball and searching for sophomore Brendan Hausen, the Cats’ best shooter, who made his 3 of 10 three-point attempts. With Hausen on the floor, Neptune opted to play his quickest guard Mark Armstrong just 16 minutes, taking away one of this best perimeter defenders when St. Joseph’s guards were on fire.
If nothing else, this result shows the city series games are still important to some teams. When Jay Wright, who had the street by the Pavilion named in his honor, were there, he stressed that and the Cats won 29 of the last 30 games before he retired, effectively minimizing the entire Big 5 concept.
Neptune is still learning that part of the job. The Big 5 may have changed shape and the games are no longer played on a regular basis at the Palestra, but the city series will always be a national treasure.
For a night at least, it appeared the Hawk will never die.
