PirateCrew: Seton Hall Pirates Football & Basketball Recruiting
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By JP Pelzman
Kadary Richmond stole a lazy TCU pass and went in for a two-handed dunk and the first points of the game.
That and a subsequent baseline jumper by Jared Rhoden that also gave Seton Hall a two-point lead represented the last moments the Pirates could feel good about themselves Friday night in San Diego.
The rest of the game was yet another NCAA nightmare for The Hall, which fell to 1-5 in Big Dance games under coach Kevin Willard after a 69-42 drubbing by ninth-seeded TCU.
The Horned Frogs moved on to a second-round date with top-seeded Arizona and a chance to pull an upset and reach the South Regional semifinals in San Antonio next week. The eighth-seeded Pirates (21-11) moved on to a potentially turbulent off-season that could see the departure of Willard, who has been their head coach for 12 seasons.
When asked after the game about the suddenly rampant rumors linking him to the vacant Maryland job, Willard didn’t exactly quash them.
“I'll give you exactly what I can tell you,” he said with a weary look. “I have an agent who I haven't talked to yet. … I don't know who he's talking to. I have absolutely no idea. But when I get home, I'll talk to my agent and discuss things with my agent.
“I've had three different agents in the last month,” he added. “My original agent I've had for 12 years (Jordan Bazant) went to TV broadcasting. I'll be honest with you. If I'm not here next year, I'd love, if Shaheen Holloway is here, that would be the happiest thing to happen to me.”
All righty then.
Let's go straight to what went wrong, and what might happen next:
Mea culpa. I should have factored in the distraction element heading into the game. It was my understanding that the Willard/Maryland situation wasn’t that “hot.” Oh, well.
That said, I still believe a team with as much life and basketball experience as that of Seton Hall, which had one of the oldest rosters in Division 1 this year, should have been mature enough to fight through it anyway. Yes, Willard could have tamped down the rumors publicly, but the players are young men. They have to wear 69-42 also.
I got this one right. The offensive woes at the Big East tournament were a warning sign. And it got worse.
Shooting 15-for-52 (28.8%) won’t win many CYO games, let alone NCAA ones. The usual reasons were there, some of which can be blamed on Willard--too much iso, not enough ball movement, flat-out bricking shots.
Call it an excuse if you like, but losing Bryce Aiken was devastating. He, not Rhoden, was the Pirates’ best iso player.
Rhoden's frustration. Rhoden shot 2-for-7 and played only 17 minutes before fouling out on an absurd charge call on which the defender was skating like Bambi on Ice.
Not that it mattered all that much, because the game was completely out of hand, but it was wrong for him to foul out on such an egregiously terrible call.
Rhoden said, "It's basketball. Calls go and they come. I didn't have the best whistle tonight, but I'm just thankful to be able to play."
Willard's endorsement. Again, not to get too far ahead of ourselves, Willard gave an unusual endorsement of his former assistant and Seton Hall legend, Shaheen Holloway. Of course, Holloway, the coach of Saint Peter’s, has some unfinished business to attend to against Murray State today in the second round of the East Region in Indianapolis.
Holloway became a sensation as a head coach in the NCAAs by guiding the Peacocks to a shocking overtime upset of Kentucky, 22 years after he dazzled as a player with a game-winning coast-to-coast driving layup in OT in the first round for the Pirates against Oregon in Buffalo.
Willard said, "He has an unbelievable knowledge of the game, unbelievable thirst for the game. And he's a tremendous person. He's a tremendous teacher. And he is going to be a tremendous leader for many, many years to come. It was one of my best days as a head coach."
Ultimately, a disappointment. Yes, The Hall went 21-11 (20-11 against Division 1) and 11-8 against the Big East. The Pirates overcame a COVID pause that led to two losses while they were shorthanded, and they pressed on after the loss of Aiken to earn yet another NCAA berth. Counting the No. 3 seed they almost surely would’ve had in 2020--work with me on this--that would make six in the last seven years under Willard.
But a 27-point curbstomping by a supposedly even opponent puts aa damper on the whole thing. Like it or not, for power-conference teams, success is determined by what happens in mid and late March. Them’s the rules. I didn’t make them. But I know what they are. And to be considered elite, Seton Hall has to break the cycle that has seen it reach the second round only once in Willard’s tenure.
But will they have the chance to do it under Willard? Apparently not, as reports are now coming out that he, indeed, is leaving for Maryland much sooner rather than later.
