City of Basketball Love

Will Slover (@WillSlover31)
--

It had been more than a year since Villanova lost its last home game.

The fourth-ranked Wildcats had their 32-game home win streak snapped at the hands of the No. 16/17 Providence Friars on Sunday afternoon by way of an 82-76 overtime decision.

The two-year long streak, which featured wins at the Wells Fargo Center, PPL Park as well as ‘Nova’s on-campus Pavilion, wasn’t the only streak that came to a halt for Villanova, as their historic 22-game Big East win streak ended on Sunday as well.

With a streak that long having never been done before in the Big East, head coach Jay Wright had become used to playing with questions regarding the win streak hovering above his team’s head.

“’I’d still rather be answering those questions. I really would,” said Wright. “You know it can happen every night. You’re never afraid to lose. We want go out and play to win and I thought we did. You lose one and you have to come out and try to get better.”

Poor shooting burdened both teams as neither reached double digits until more than seven minutes into the first half.

After what looked like would be another easy Wildcat win early in the first half, with Villanova  (17-3, 7-1) coming out to a 29-18 lead with 5 minutes to go, Providence (17-3, 5-2) went on a 17-5 run that saw them take the lead briefly before Jalen Brunson sank a three at the buzzer to give Villanova the lead at the half.

Brunson’s three was the only bright spot from long range in a first half that saw Villanova go 3-of-13 from deep prior to that.

“We just settled and took the first one,” Wright said. “Everyone trying to get a three rather than just make the right play.”

Their three point shooting woes continued into the second half and the Wildcats finished the game shooting just 9-of-31 from beyond the arc.

Despite the team's struggles, senior Ryan Arcidacono finished with 19 points and junior Josh Hart added 18 of his own.

With Villanova’s defense focused on Kris Dunn, Providence needed another player to come up big and they got that in sophomore big man Ben Bentil.

Bentil finished with 31 points, a Big East career high, and 13 rebounds.

“I thought we were really well prepared coming into this game,” said Wright. “And we still couldn’t stop Bentil.”

Dunn, the Friars' star junior guard who's almost certainly NBA-bound after the season, might not have had his usual game in the points column, finishing with 13, but he made up for his lack of scoring with his crafty passing.

“Holding Dunn to 13 points is not an accomplishment because he still had 14 assists,” said Wright. “He’s a great player, he’s going to beat you one way or the other and he knew we were really trying to prevent him from getting off anything easy and he just found his teammates and made great plays for his teammates.”

Dunn’s scoring might have been sparse, but when he did, it was when he team needed it most, as he hit a three with 1:11 remaining in the second half to give him team a 64-63 lead.

After two free throws from Kyron Cartwright and a three point lead in Providence’s favor, Villanova needed a big shot to keep their homes and lengthening their win streak alive and who other to get the ball than senior captain Ryan Arcidiacono.

With seven seconds remaining in regulation, Arcidiacono drilled a three from NBA range and sent the game into overtime.

After an early three pointer from Kris Jenkins to start the overtime period and two minutes of scoreless basketball, Providence finally got on the board thanks to Bentil, who had 10 points in overtime.

Following Bentil’s bucket, Providence went on a 13-5 lead that saw them take the lead and take it for good with a layup from Junior Lomomba that put Providence ahead 70-69 with 1:51 to go.

Losing isn’t something the Wildcats are used to, and Villanova needs to find a way to get back on track with 10 Big East games still left to play.

“We’ve got to get a lot better,” said Josh Hart,  “We’ve got to get back to the basics. Focus on defending. Focus on rebounding. The thing to take from this is we have to get better every day.”