Takeaways from Providence's 89-84 Loss to Villanova
1. Let’s start with the crowd — once again. When Ed Cooley vowed to “set this place on fire” upon being hired in March 2011, I never dreamed it would look like this:
This matchup between two top ten teams nationally — #8 Providence and #10 Villanova — brought out all sorts of national media members and they were universal in their praise of the Dunkin Donuts Center experience on Tuesday night.
2. I can’t imagine Providence can replicate that crowd again this season, but anything close to it and the Friars will be an extremely tough out for Xavier (Feb. 23) and Creighton (Feb. 26) when they visit here over the next ten days.
Every Providence fan deserved to experience just how special it was. It was just an experience.
3. As for the game itself, what killed Providence was their porous pick and roll defense. That has been a bit of an achilles heel for PC all season, as they rank in just the 8th percentile in stopping the roll man off of pick and rolls.
They are in the 53rd percentile in slowing the pick and roll ball handler, but that was the problem on Tuesday. And it wasn’t just one player doing the game — Justin Moore (18 first half points) and Collin Gillespie (23 in the second) took turns having their way with the Friar defense.
Villanova went to the pick and roll on 28 possessions on Tuesday.
4. Ed Cooley would have been beyond thrilled if he were told pregame that his team would score 84 points, make 25-39 from inside the 3-point arc (64.1%), hold a 12-7 advantage on the offensive glass, and turn the ball over just nine times.
The difference came at the 3-point arc, where Nova shot 11-23 (47.8%) versus PC’s 5-23 (21.7%). Providence’s fifth three pointer came in garbage time when Jared Bynum knocked down a deep one with the game in hand.
5. I know it’s easier said than done, but I would have loved to have seen Providence punish the switching Villanova defense with Nate Watson even more than they did. Watson finished 6-9 from the field and 8-12 at the free throw line for 20 points. Watson was just one of the Friars who did serious damage in the paint. Here are their shooting numbers from inside the arc:
Al Durham: 5-10
Ed Croswell: 4-5
AJ Reeves: 3-4
Jared Bynum: 5-8
6. There was a stretch early in the second half in which AJ Reeves was torching Villanova on drives and floaters. There were two things I loved about Reeves’ game his senior year at Brimmer & May, and those were a developing floater game, and the other was when he measured up defenders from the top of the key. He scored on four straight possessions for Providence in the opening four minutes of the second half.
So often, we see quick shot releases from Reeves, and this play reminded me of how Reeves attacked at the prep level — he was measured, went into attack mode, and finished with control.
7. Yes, Providence had lapses defensively on Tuesday, but credit Villanova with making PC pay seemingly every time they occurred.
Sometimes it simply comes down to your opponent making a shot. Case in point: Providence’s win at UConn in December. PC led by double figures in the second half, and saw that lead dwindle to two with under two minutes to play. Isaiah Whaley bobbled what should have been an easy put-back to tie the game with 1:13 left, then kicked the ball out to Tyrese Martin for a wide open three. Martin missed it, Al Durham scored on the other end, and PC went on to win.
8. Ed Cooley had a lot of difficult decisions to make on the defensive side of the ball. He had to have been concerned about his best offensive player in Big East play (Bynum) getting repeatedly posted by Villanova’s guards.
Then Justin Moore went off in the first half, and Collin Gillespie in the second. I was actually in favor of PC playing zone, which they did on 14 of Villanova’s 69 possessions. The Wildcats scored on five of those possessions, and were stopped on nine of them.
9. While Villanova will, deservedly, get credit for answering each of PC’s runs, the Friars also battled back on numerous occasions when Nova threatened to make it a three possession game:
The close to the first half was a bit deflating for PC. The Friars trailed 13-6 early, as Justin Moore simply couldn’t miss in the opening minutes, but rallied back to within a point at 34-33 with 2:58 to go in the half. Nova went on a 7-1 run to close the half and head into the locker room up, 46-39. Nova had the ball to start the second half, but PC got a stop and two buckets from Nate Watson to kick off the second half to make it 46-43 seventy seconds in. That was huge at the time.
Jay Wright’s club later led 54-47 (a lead that was cut down by a Reeves 3-pointer and floater), 63-56 (which PC countered with an 8-1 run to tie it before Caleb Daniels hit a back-breaking 3-pointer with 8:54 left), and finally 73-66 (which PC answered with a 7-2 run to make it a two point game with 3:43 left).
10. Plays that stood out:
I’ve loved everything about Jared Bynum’s game this season, but his decision to go for the kill shot 3-pointer in a two point game with 3:26 to play was an overeager decision. Providence seemed to have all of the momentum, riding a 7-2 spurt with the ball, when Bynum hoisted a 3-pointer four seconds into the shot clock that would have given PC the lead. Gillespie answered on the other end with a three of his own, and it was back to a five point game.
The aforementioned Caleb Daniels three with just under nine minutes left was a killer. Providence had just pulled even for the first time in the second half on a crazy reverse layup from Al Durham when Daniels knocked one down late in the shot clock to silence a blisteringly loud crowd.
The cameras didn’t catch it, but Ed Cooley had a huge smile on his face after Durham hit a tough shot in traffic in the second half. Durham, who finished with 13 points after going without a point for the game’s first 28 minutes, was just starting to assert himself at that moment. Cooley’s smile was reminiscent of the one we saw from him against Xavier in the 2018 Big East Tournament Semifinals when PC stormed back from 17 down to win in overtime.
It didn’t feel like Nova had many answers when Bynum and Durham decided to get to the rim.
After Watson finished an and-1 to pull PC to within 78-76 with 1:45 to play, the Friars somehow lost Eric Dixon on the out of bounds play. Brandon Slater hoisted a pretty daring 80 foot pass to the Nova big man, who had lost Ed Croswell, and finished an and-1 of his own. Cooley took the blame for that play in the postgame, noting that he was trying to force Nova into a turnover against a frenzied crowd. He said he thought, in hindsight, that PC should have just gone man, but I liked the call — especially when considering that Gillespie was getting whatever he wanted late.
The final two minutes perfectly exemplified the entirety of this game. There was the Dixon bucket after Watson’s score. After Durham countered with a layup to make it 80-78 at the 1:15 mark, Gillespie drew a foul and made both free throws. Durham drove the length of the floor and scored just five seconds later, setting up Gillespie’s 3-pointer at the top of the key to push Nova ahead, 85-80, and all but end it. Providence had a miscommunication on a screen, and Gillespie made them pay. Once again, PC pushed, but Villanova pushed back harder.