By Jake Copestick (@JakeCopestick)
VILLANOVA, Pa. — Duke Brennan has played a lot of college basketball to be fazed by one game.
On Tuesday night, Villanova ran into the buzzsaw that is the No. 2-ranked Michigan Wolverines, and became the fifth straight opponent to lose to Dusty May’s squad by 25 or more points. Brennan found himself in foul trouble for much of the contest, logging 22 minutes in which he scored just five points and grabbed six rebounds, far under his season average of 12 as the nation’s leading rebounder.
Fast forward to Saturday evening's 79-61 win over Villanova’s old school Big East rival Pittsburgh, and Brennan had totally flipped the script.
In his 108th college game, the forward scored a career-high 24 points, and was a flawless 8-for-8 from the field. He grabbed nine rebounds, one shy of recording his fourth double-double of the season, and chipped in four assists. As much as Tuesday night’s result in Ann Arbor wasn’t what anyone in the Villanova program wanted, Brennan’s played enough to know how important it is to turn the page.
“You’ve got to bounce back, especially after bad losses,” he said. “We had two great days of practice that prepared us for this game. Bouncing back and defending our home court is really important.”
Although Brennan has become known by Villanova fans for his ability to clean the glass and grab rebounds, head coach Kevin Willard sees the value in terms of on-court production that getting his big man involved in the offense does for the team, but also that they can throw him a bone for all the dirty work that he does in the paint.
“I think the more we can get Duke involved in pick-and-rolls and get him on rolls, it just puts pressure on the weak-side defense,” Willard said. “When we can get him some points down low, I think it rewards him for how hard he plays throughout the game. It also keeps him involved and keeps him happy a little bit, to be honest with you.”
Matching Brennan’s game-high 24 points was redshirt sophomore Bryce Lindsay, who made four of Villanova’s nine three-pointers. Lindsay is a dynamic scorer on his own, but with Brennan’s presence offensively, it helps them both out, and in turn, the Wildcats as a whole. The duo of Lindsay and Brennan made eight field goals each, spearheading a Villanova offense that went on to shoot 52 percent for the game.
“I’d be happy to pass the ball to Duke because of how hard he works on both sides of the ball,” Lindsay said. “It definitely frees me up, and him up.”
Lindsay has only improved off of a productive season at James Madison a year ago, one that saw him drain 87 three-pointers, the third-most in the Sun Belt, and average over 13 points per game. Saturday’s win was the sixth time this season that he has scored 18 or more points in a game. He’s had no issue adjusting to Villanova and the Big East, a step up from where he was in Harrisonburg last year for the Dukes.
“It’s my preparation,” he said. “I put the work in knowing that it’s going to show up on the court.”
The scoring has been there for Lindsay, and so has his ability to take care of the ball. Lindsay dished out three of Villanova’s 20 assists on Saturday, while as a team, the Wildcats committed just three turnovers. Lindsay and star freshman Acaden Lewis, who had a game-high seven assists, are getting more comfortable with each passing game. For a team that has 11 new players from a season ago, Saturday was a huge step in the right direction in sharing and caring for the ball. No player recorded more than one turnover, and 20 of the Wildcats’ 26 made field goals were assisted.
Willard sees the progress from the guards as they get game reps under their belts.
“When you have young guards, you’ve got a team that hasn’t been together overly long, sometimes it takes a little time to kind of know what works and what doesn’t work,” he said. “I think Acaden and Bryce are doing a really good job of trying to learn what we’re trying to do. We saw a monster drop coverage at Michigan, something that these guys have never seen before. They’ve never seen that size, so to go through that drop and now see a little more switching, I think they’ll get used to what the defense is giving them.”
“That’s just being more patient, letting them understand and kind of say we still need to do a much better job when teams are switching on us, but they’re getting there. I think they’re starting to understand what to look for.”
As good as this game was offensively for the Wildcats, their defense deserves credit too. Pitt shot just 5-for-22 from the three-point line, and committed twelve turnovers, four times as many as Villanova had itself. Once again, it was Lewis, the team's leader in steals, pressuring the ball all over the court. Villanova made the Panthers pay for their mistakes, scoring 16 points off of 12 Pitt’s turnovers.
From the offense to the defense, to the passing and taking care of the ball, Saturday’s win was big for Villanova, who showed resolve after Tuesday’s thwarting at the hands of the hottest team in college basketball. The response pleased Willard, as his team now has its collective eye on Wisconsin and its final non-conference test before Big East play starts.
“They responded great,” he said. “We took Wednesday off, came in Thursday and Friday and practiced really hard. I think these guys showed today, especially on the defensive end, coming in and letting a tough loss go. They came back and played really well.”
