Led by a career night from Duke Brennan, Villanova (8-2) gets back to its winning ways with a 18-point victory over old Big East rival Pittsburgh. It is the first win over the Panthers since the 2009 Elite Eight.
The aforementioned Brennan did work all night in the paint, scoring 24 points on a perfect 8/8 from the field. He was able to score both on pick-and-rolls and on short post-ups. “Big Duke” had it all working. His previous career high was 19 points, which he scored in his sophomore season
at Arizona State.
Co-leading the Wildcats in scoring was Bryce Lindsay, who made 8/18 shots overall and 4/11 from deep. The combination of Brennan, Lindsay and Acaden Lewis (11 points and 7 assists) scored 59 of Villanova’s 79 points. Lewis was also surgical in orchestrating the offense.
A big development in this game was the three-point defense, holding the Panthers to 5/22 from three. The drawback of that seemed to be rebounding, as the switches caused some mismatches that Kevin Willard said he would take a closer look at after the game. Winning the battle on the boards hasn’t been an issue for the Wildcats this year.
Pittsburgh kept the game close for much of the night, mostly behind Barry Dunning Jr.’s 17 points and Nojus Indrusaitis’ 14 points off of the bench.
Villanova has its final out-of-conference game coming up on Friday, Dec. 19 in Milwaukee against Wisconsin. It’s a great opportunity to get a signature win.
