The sounds of cheers and chants echoed through the stands of the Wells Fargo Center on Friday evening.
Blue and white Villanova jerseys flashed throughout the arena. A yellow mob of students emerged near the opposing bench, dressed in flashy banana costumes—a new superstition that debuted against St John’s. The bananas hyped the student section up while inflatable bananas flew across the crowd.
Amidst all the chaos, former Wildcat Kyle Lowry—who has seen rowdy crowds in the Wells Fargo Center before with the 76ers—was in attendance.
The Villanova community came alive in the team’s final regular season game at the Wells Fargo Center.
The Wildcats (16-12, 9-8 Big East) entered their final game in Philadelphia needing a win to bolster their tournament resume. Standing in their way was the No. 16 Marquette Golden Eagles (20-7, 11-5 Big East), a team who once ranked as high as No. 5 this season.
However, despite being underdogs at their second home court, the Wildcats took care of business in front of a boisterous crowd of 10,862—earning their fourth victory against a ranked opponent this year.
In a dominant performance, Villanova defeated No. 16 Marquette 81-66, snapping a two-game conference skid and maintaining ground for fifth place in the Big East conference.
Coming off two road losses against conference rivals Providence and UConn, the Wildcats seemed to erase the memories of their shortcomings and opened the game with a three-point barrage.
The Wildcats won the tip-off, leading to senior guard Wooga Poplar finding graduate forward Eric Dixon, who knocked down a three to put Villanova out front early.
Two possessions later, graduate guard Jhamir Brickus knocked down threes on back-to-back Villanova possessions. Dixon would later tack on another three on the ensuing offensive set.
The leading scorer in the nation finished with a team-leading 23 points.
With barely three minutes passing in the opening half, Villanova was perfect on four attempts from beyond the arc and held a 10-point 14-4 lead.
“We can do that—that’s something that this team has,” Villanova coach Kyle Neptune said. “We have high-level three-point shooters, guys that can really make shots.”
Marquette played catch-up from that point on.
The Golden Eagles struggled to find offensive efficiency early. Already in a double-digit hole, Marquette didn’t crack double-digit points until halfway through the opening frame.
Villanova’s pressured on-ball defense limited scoring opportunities for Marquette’s three leading scorers. The Wildcats held seniors Kam Jones, David Joplin and Stevie Mitchell to 12 combined points in the first half and 17 for the whole game.
While Marquette’s offensive core struggled, Villanova’s team remained scorching hot.
Brickus would add two more threes with style. He put the moves on Mitchell, hitting a nasty crossover stepback jumper, nearly breaking Mitchell’s ankles. It hit nothing but net.
He later drained another one from behind the arc, giving Villanova a 13-point halftime lead. Brickus finished the game with 21 points, his second-most on the season behind a 22-point performance against St. Joe’s on Nov. 12.
In the first half, Villanova went 12-15 from beyond the arc, seemingly unable to miss. The Big East’s No. 1 three-point shooting offense had rekindled their former identity.
“We did not do a good enough job having a level of hand pressure and activity and disruptivity to take those shots away,” Marquette coach Shaka Smart said.
In the second half, both teams cooled off.
In the second half, Villanova shot 32% from the field, while Marquette shot 36.67 percent. The Wildcats’ lights-out three-point shooting faded away, as they converted on only three of their 11 attempts from behind the arc.
Both teams traded blows early, with Marquette opening the second half on an 8-5 run to cut the lead to 10. Junior guard Chase Ross opened the scoring with an and-one tip-in, followed by a Jones layup and three-pointer from junior forward Ben Gold.
With the lead cut down to the smallest it had since the 13-minute mark in the first half, sloppy mistakes halted any comeback attempt for the Golden Eagles.
Two fouls on back-to-back three-point attempts netted six points on free throws by senior guard Jordan Longino and freshman Jordann Dumont.
Dumont’s free throws capped off a perfect shooting night for the freshman, who had only scored 14 career points before Friday’s game. He finished with 15 points on 4-4 shooting from beyond the arc and a perfect 3-3 from the charity stripe after coming off the bench.
“Guys did a good job just finding me,” Dumont said. “I stayed ready for when my number was called.”
Similarly, Marquette found efficient production from their rotation as well.
Sophomore guard Zaide Lowery had a career night, scoring 25 points on 9-10 shooting and a perfect 5-5 from beyond the arc. Lowery kept the Golden Eagles within striking distance, scoring 16 points in the second half. However, their inconsistent first half proved far too large to overcome.
In addition to inconsistent shooting, Marquette, the team with the highest turnover margin in the Big East, failed to generate many turnovers. Forcing 15.37 turnovers on average, the Golden Eagles only forced seven Villanova turnovers, the same amount as themselves, mitigating any statistical advantage.
Combined with Villanova’s three-point barrage and poor scoring from their stars, Marquette never led or tied the score for the entire game following Dixon’s opening possession three.
“Tonight we were going to come in and try to play our hardest, try to defend and rebound the highest level no matter what,” Neptune said. “I thought either way we put ourselves in a great spot. We really held (Marquette) especially early defensively. I thought that was key.”
With the victory, Villanova adds another Quad 1 victory to their tournament resume before the Big East Tournament. The Wildcats will play Seton Hall on Feb. 26.
The Golden Eagles have now lost four of their last six games. They will look to turn this trend around on Feb. 25 when they host Providence.
Photography by Luke Kaiser.
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