City of Basketball Love

Rich Flanagan (@richflanagan)
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Kris Jenkins has seen enough of the shot to understand what it meant for the Villanova basketball program.

His game-winning 3-pointer in the national championship game to lift the Wildcats past North Carolina has been shown more times than he can count. It was a lasting moment but with one catch: it happened last season and the last thing he wants to do is have many focus on that shot than the ones he’ll be attempting this season.

“Coming into the season, we know that if we sit and think about what happened in the past, that’s only going to hurt us,” Jenkins said. “We got back to business pretty early because we had games this summer in Spain. We put that behind us pretty early so that we could ready for those games.”

In the Wildcats’ home opener against Lafayette, Jenkins started the year the same way he ended last by knocking down a jumper, the first basket of the season, as No .4 Villanova cruised to an 88-48 victory.  

The 6-foot-6, 236-pound senior hit five more field goals in the opening half including three from beyond the arc and finish with 16 points.

Jenkins was shooting as if he could not wait for the offseason to end hoisting ten shots before the break. As Villanova maintained a 30-point lead for the entire second half, he played only 12 minutes and was able to watch the rest of his teammates showcase what they could do. Head coach Jay Wright has continually stressed that this a new season and the Wildcats should not view themselves as defending national champions as they’re referencing what happened last season. Jenkins, along with fellow senior Josh Hart (13 points, three assists), have worked to remain humble and have been able to reciprocate that to the rest of the roster.

“We have guys who are coachable, and want to listen and win. In order for us to continue to win, we have to continue to put that behind us and focus on what’s going on in front of us,” Jenkins said. “I believe it’s pretty easy to do because we have a team that’s hungry and we’re looking forward to our next game [vs Purdue] which is going to be a big challenge for us.”

Villanova (1-0) certainly played like a defending national champion scoring 16 points off of ten Lafayette turnovers, scoring 32 points in the paint and receiving 17 points from its bench. Wright was just happy to finally get on the court and play basketball.

“I personally feel playing a game is probably the best thing we could do to get past last season. I really feel a difference now that we’re a game in, we’ve played somebody [and] it’s a new season,” Wright said.

In addition to Jenkins and Hart, point guard Jalen Brunson scored a team-high 17 points and Mikal Bridges added 16 of his own. While the Wildcats dominated the Leopards offensively, they were able to control the glass on defense as six players had at least five boards each. Wright noticed a change in Jenkins, who had five rebounds, saying he “has gotten so much quicker and he’s in such great shape,” particularly on defensive rotations.

Having been able to transition from the apex of college basketball back to reality has given Jenkins time to reflect and see where he still wants to elevate his game to. He went through the NBA Draft process but decided to return to Villanova and focus on where he still needs to improve. Many have already seen his improvement and Jenkins, who sits just 71 points from 1,000 for his career, feels like he’s ready to take on the immense expectations that come with that improvement.

“Everybody upped their standards for me even my family back [in Maryland.] to my teammates and coaching staff here. Everybody up their standards for me and it was up to me to meet that expectation and keep it,” Jenkins said.