City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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(Ed. Note: This article is part of our 2023-24 season coverage, which will run for the six weeks preceding the first official games of the year on Nov. 6. To access all of our high school and college preview content for this season click here.)

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Was Villanova’s 2022-23 season a blip, a bump in a road? Or was it a sign that the program’s recent stint as a collegiate blue blood is over? 

The next four months — if not much sooner — should provide the answer. 

Last year was a decidedly un-Villanova result, a 17-17 finish the program’s worst overall record in 11 years and only the third time since 2000 the Wildcats weren’t above .500. But unlike the 13-19 season in 2011-12, the low point of Jay Wright’s Hall of Fame tenure, this group is under new management in Kyle Neptune, the former ‘Nova assistant and (briefly) Fordham head coach who’s yet to prove whether he’s going to keep the train rolling along on Ithan Avenue.

That’s not to say last year was an indictment of Neptune, either. The Wildcats, already dealing with the graduation of a big ‘22 senior class, struggled through two major injuries and a handful of minor ones, a mid-season transfer making the rotation even shorter. 

“It is what it is,” Neptune said of the roster struggles in his first year. “Each year is a different challenge. That was the challenge of last year, and we still had a bunch of good players on that team — it was just a different challenge.”

There are plenty of reasons to believe last year was more of a temporary halt to the program’s winning tradition. Factor in the institutional advantages — including a burgeoning NIL collective led by Randy Foye — and permeation of “The Villanova Way” all along Lancaster Avenue. Former ‘Nova players populate the staff, from general manager Baker Dunleavey on down. Neptune didn’t play at Villanova, but he spent 10 years on Wright’s staff, two as video coordinator and eight as an assistant coach.

Six wins in seven games in February once the Wildcats got healthier was another good sign, though it wasn’t enough to maintain a run of nine straight NCAA Tournaments. 

“From the outside looking in, it might look like a down year or unacceptable or whatever the case may be,” senior forward Eric Dixon said. “The one thing about here that I can appreciate is we treat every day the same, and we have the same motto every single year: we just look to be the best team that we can be by the end of the season. So whatever that comes out to be, we’re going to be OK with it. 

“Last year it was 17-17, but there was never a moment where it was like, ‘That guy’s quitting on me,’ or ‘Coach is out of it, he doesn’t care.’ We were all-in the whole time, and that’s a success for me.”

To help ensure that last season was indeed a blip and nothing longer-lasting, Neptune brought in four transfers all in their fourth or fifth year of college hoops — T.J. Bamba (Washington State), Hakim Hart (Maryland), Tyler Burton (Richmond) and Lance Ware (Kentucky). Those four might not have been here a year ago, but they understand the situation and didn’t come to Villanova to finish .500 and spend March watching hoops from home. 

“From my experience with the team, from my experience with (Neptune), he’s always saying we’re just trying to get better,” Bamba said. “Everybody knows it wasn’t the best year last year, even though we don’t really talk about it much. We just make sure that everything we do here, we approach it differently so that back-to-back [.500] years don’t occur.”

In addition to the new blood, Neptune has a good bit of returning talent in preseason All-Big East First Team selection Justin Moore and Dixon, a second team pick, with sophomore guard Mark Armstrong expected to be a breakout star candidate. Brendan Hausen, another sophomore, looks like one of the best shooters on the team; juniors Nnanna Njoku and Jordan Longino both seem to be finally healthy. 

All those reasons for optimism are why the Wildcats were voted No. 22 in the preseason Associated Press poll, not quite as high as they were in most of the polls from 2013-2022 but far from an afterthought.

“We know we had a tough year last year, but I think we can take some positives from last year,” Dixon said. “Of course (we) want to play better than what we did last year, so I think it’s a little bit of a motivating factor, but we just want to learn from that, and now it helps us because we have 13, 14 [guys], everyone can play. So I think we’re going to turn that negative into a positive this year.”

It shouldn’t take too long to figure out just how good this year’s group is. After opening up with home games against American and Le Moyne followed by a Big 5 game at Penn, the Wildcats host Maryland on Nov. 17, followed by a trip to the Bahamas for the Battle 4 Atlantis. They’ll also play at Kansas State (Dec. 5) and host UCLA at the Wells Fargo Center (Dec. 9), all before Big East play starts Dec. 20 at Creighton.

Another 17-win season would no doubt feel like a step backwards. This group might not need to win a third national championship in the last 10 years for it to be considered a return to form, but Neptune’s got a group wholly capable of winning another Big East title and making it at least to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament, a fairly common benchmark for high-major success. 

Of course, this team wants to go much deeper into the spring.

“I just feel like it’s us, it’s us, wanting to be great,” Bamba said. “We go so hard, we move so differently. I don’t think we do that just to be mediocre.”