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DiVincenzo makes most of his first NCAA Tournament action

03/17/2017, 12:15am EDT
By Matt Trabold

Matt Trabold (@TrabsMatt)
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BUFFALO, N.Y. -- During his career-best night, in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, Donte DiVincenzo still had to live down two embarrassing moments.

Even though he had an open lane to the tin on both of those occasions, DiVincenzo missed a dunk. To make matters worse, the first missed dunk attempt went off the rim and hit the television camera on top of the shot clock.

“It’s just the next play,” DiVincenzo said. “Coach stresses that all the time. It’s the next play.” 

DiVincenzo was living proof of that on thursday night, as the 6-foot-5 Wildcat redshirt freshman followed up each of his missed dunks with something much more useful: points.

With 6:03 left in regulation in an eleven-point game, DiVincenzo was marred by his first missed dunk attempt. Luckily for the Wildcats though, he shook it off quick and sent home a long three-pointer in Villanova’s very next possession. In the sequence where DiVincenzo had to deal with his second missed dunk attempt of the evening, he got his own rebound and laid it in right afterwards.

The stat line that came out of the big night for DiVincenzo was 21 points on 3-of-4 shooting from downtown and a career-high thirteen rebounds - the first double-digit rebounding outing of his still young men’s college basketball career. It propelled the top overall seed of the 2017 NCAA Tournament in Villanova to a 76-56 victory over the sixteen-seed in the East Region in Mount St. Mary’s.

It was not the first NCAA Tournament DiVincenzo was a member of the Wildcats for, but this one against the Mountaineers (20-16) was the first time he was actually able to see the floor for Jay Wright’s club. He ended up redshirting last year after breaking a bone in his right foot just eight games in.

“I mean, it's a big stage, my first time being in an NCAA Tournament. But my mindset was just our next game,” DiVincenzo said. “It was our biggest game because it was our next game. My energy went towards my teammates. I wasn't focused on anything on the outside, and I think it showed tonight.”

A notable narrative in the men’s college basketball world over the past couple years has been how legendary of a rebounding guard this season’s Big East Player of the Year in Josh Hart has been. DiVincenzo was seemingly not that type of guard just yet. Coming into today, his game-high this campaign for rebounding was eight on one occasion. He accomplished that in the title game of the 2017 Big East Men’s Championship against Creighton.

“Once I see the ball go up in the air, something in my head clicks to just go get it with every single rebound,” DiVincenzo said. “It’s what we do every single day in practice. It’s kind of just a habit of mine.”

DiVincenzo will get a chance to go 2-for-2 coming away with a double-double in an NCAA Tournament game to start his run in the sport on Saturday at KeyBank Center. Villanova (32-3) will square off against the winner of the ballgame between eight-seed Wisconsin and nine-seed Virginia Tech.


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