DePaul drops chance to climb Big East standings, loses to Villanova
A DePaul revival is a very relative idea.
These days, improvement means finishing above .500 or not landing in the bottom two of the Big East standings. The Blue Demons just won three straight Big East road games for the first time.
Of course, this is all light years away from the program's peak in the late 1970s and early '80s. Most current DePaul students were born after the Quentin Richardson era ended. Maybe they have parents or grandparents who can describe the glory and heartbreak of the Mark Aguirre years.
Wednesday brought a good measuring stick game, with third-place Villanova visiting Wintrust Arena. The Blue Demons missed a great opportunity to take command in the first half, then faded in the second while losing 76-57.
DePaul has dropped 27 of its last 28 games against Villanova. The visitors shot just 27.6% from the field in the first half but managed to build a 26-24 lead.
“We've just got to play with a little more poise,” DePaul coach Chris Holtmann said. “They were scoring at will in the second half. We struggled with their physicality as much as anything.”
Had DePaul won, there was a very feasible scenario where the Demons could have earned the No. 4 seed in next week's Big East tournament. They just needed Seton Hall to lose to No. 18-ranked St. John's, then beat eighth-place Butler at home.
Even with this loss, DePaul (16-14, 8-10) can still catch Creighton for the five seed by winning Saturday.
The first-half failures were especially frustrating for DePaul because it mostly involved defenders biting on 3-point shot fakes. It happened three times before intermission, giving Villanova one 4-point play and 4 of 6 free throws.
DePaul guard Layden Blocker got off to a fast start, gliding to the bucket for three early lay-ins and a 13-5 DePaul lead. But then he picked up two fouls in 10 seconds — one on the offensive end, the other hacking a 3-point shooter — and had to go to the bench.
The Demons briefly tied it up early in the second half, then Villanova buried 3 shots from 3-point land and slowly pulled away. Guard Devin Askew and 6-10 center Duke Brennan combined to hit 9 of 9 shots in the second half, while Villanova shot 64.3% as a team.
“We just didn't have the same bite we've had,” Holtmann said. “We weren't able to respond the way we needed to. We've had that the whole year, whether we get down or not, we've had a great response.”
Sophomore guard Brandon Maclin led DePaul with 16 points. The Demons went just 2-for-16 from 3-point land, a season low for makes.
Holtmann has been trying his best to create a louder atmosphere at Wintrust, offering students free lunch after victories and even buying rounds of drinks after the game against Marquette on Jan. 18. For this midweek matchup, there was a decent crowd but no signs of a rowdy student section.
DePaul's eight Big East wins are the most in 19 years, since Jerry Wainwright's team went 9-7 in 2006-07. They can still match Wainwright's total by beating Butler.
“This program was once good,” said Maclin, who's in his first year at DePaul after starting at Radford. “We've got to build that back up. I believe we are the foundation to this program getting back up where it needs to be.”