City of Basketball Love

By Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Stuck in the doldrums against Georgetown, Villanova’s women couldn’t get stuck in their own heads. That’s a lesson that Denise Dillon had more sure to drill into her players, who’ve experienced some offensive frustrations at points this year and are learning to battle through it.

“Denise is always reminding me if we talk out loud, then you’re not in your head,” Wildcats junior Lucy Olsen said. “We’ve got to keep talking (we get) in tight situations or if (we’re) missing shots, because (we’ve) got to stay confident.”

Even as the Wildcats went through one of their worst offensive stretches of the season, their defense didn’t fold. For the second game in a row, Villanova failed to reach 60 points but still came away victorious, coming up with one key stop after another to emerge with a 53-51 overtime win over Georgetown on Wednesday afternoon.

A pair of foul shots — one from Olsen and one from Kaitlyn Orihel — in the game’s final six seconds provided the final margin in a game that had 10 ties and seven lead changes.

It wasn’t pretty, but the Wildcats locked in on the defensive end, forcing 19 turnovers, blocking nine shots and holding the Hoyas to 32.8% (21-of-64) from the floor.

“Our shots weren’t falling, we were getting some good shots, but we can always control the defensive end,” Olsen said. “We were just trying to stay locked in, communicate, we’ll get the stop and then focus on the next possession after.”

It was a win that Villanova (10-5, 3-1) looked ready to win in a somewhat more decisive fashion when it held a seven-point lead going into the fourth quarter, a crowd of a thousand or so elementary and middle school students keeping the Finneran Pavilion plenty lively for an 11:30 AM tipoff. 

But the Wildcats scored just four points the entire fourth quarter, going the final eight minutes of regulation without so much as a point. Georgetown (12-4, 2-3) had three buckets in that span, ever-so-slowly closing that gap from six points to zero with three minutes left.

Nobody could put it away in regulation; Villanova’s Bella Runyan had a strong drive to the hoop just ahead of the final buzzer, but her layup rolled off the rim. Olsen, the Wildcats’ star junior who scored 28 points in the win, missed a pair of foul shots with under two minutes left in the fourth quarter.

Villanova shot 7-of-26 (26.9%) from the floor in the second half, 20-of-64 (31.3%) for the game.

Maddie Burke (above, left) and Villanova have allowed less than 50.0 ppg over their last five games. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

Instead of folding at the other end, however, the Wildcats held strong. They forced a 30-second call on Georgetown with 10 seconds left in regulation, forced another Georgetown turnover — the Hoyas’ 19th of the afternoon — with five seconds left in overtime after Olsen split a pair from the line to put the Wildcats up 52-51. 

Orihel added hers with 2.2 seconds left, a final Georgetown half-court heave hitting the rim and bouncing clear.

“We knew it was going to be a defensive battle, and it certainly was,” Dillon said. “Just really pleased with our commitment to staying within it on the defensive end, finding ways to get the ball back and just pulling out a real tough win.”

The ‘Nova women started their season off strong, winning five of their first six games, including a win over a very good Richmond squad and a 28-point beatdown of Big 5 rival Temple. The back half of the Wildcats’ non-conference slate was not so kind, as they lost four of their next five, including their league opener at St. John’s. 

But their win over Georgetown was the fourth in a row for Dillon’s group, which has held its last five opponents to an average of 49.2 ppg.

“Obviously we’re a work in progress, just still trying to work together and find that identity,” Dillon said. 

The team’s still looking for a consistent second scorer to step up next to Olsen, who came into Wednesday averaging 23.0 ppg, good for fifth in the country. She was the only one in double figures against Georgetown; Runyan and Orihel added eight apiece, and nobody else had more than three.

Olsen is the only Wildcat averaging in double figures, followed by Christina Dalce (9.7 ppg) and freshman Maddie Webber (7.8 ppg), who combined for six points against the Hoyas. With home games against top-level Big East teams coming up in Marquette (Jan. 17) and Creighton (Jan. 21), not to mention UConn (Jan. 31), they’ll need that to happen sooner rather than later.

“I wish there was a little bit more consistency from others to lighten that [scoring load] a little [for Olsen],” Dillon said. “Lucy Olsen, she works. And you get results when you work. But again at the same time, giving her a little relief, we need to get some other players to come along at that pace as well.”

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