PirateCrew: Seton Hall Pirates Football & Basketball Recruiting
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By JP Pelzman
Seton Hall fans hate enduring that near-yearly production of That January Swoon. But the bright side is that it often leads to the crowd-pleasing Kevin Willard production of A February To Remember.
And what is most fun is seeing who the leading man will be, beginning with Isaiah Whitehead back in 2016. This time around, it was senior wing Jared Rhoden, who averaged 17.1 points as The Hall went 6-2 in February. Rhoden capped it off with a career-high 30 points as the Pirates (18-9, 9-8 Big East) cruised to an 82-66 win over fading Xavier in Cincinnati.
Seton Hall is now 33-19 in the shortest month of the year since that 2015-16 campaign.
And even though the Musketeers (17-11, 7-10) are in free fall with their fourth consecutive loss and sixth in their last seven games, their NET ranking still is 35 after the loss (down from 25 entering Saturday). Thus, it counts as a Quad 1 win for The Hall barring the unlikely occurrence of the Musketeers falling out of the top 75.
Seton Hall's NET shot up from 38 to 32.
“Seven years of life on the bubble,” Seton Hall coach Kevin Willard said with a laugh when broadcaster Gary Cohen asked him about his team’s NCAA tournament chances on the postgame on WMCA 570 AM. “I'm always worried.”
But he quickly added, referencing the Pirates’ 9-1 pre-COVID pause start, “We're not just playing well now. … We're definitely an NCAA tournament team.”
“We’re where we’re supposed to be," Rhoden said, per Jerry Carino of Gannett New Jersey. “We’ve had some struggles and a little down stretch. But we’re getting back to where we thought we were going to be this year--where our potential is. The sky’s the limit for us.”
Seton Hall went ahead to stay on Rhoden’s three with 6:19 left in the first half, breaking a tie at 22. Kadary Richmond (12 points, seven assists) assisted on the final two baskets of the half, a three by Tray Jackson (17 points) and a two by Myles Cale, putting the Pirates ahead 39-31 at intermission.
Although Willard told Cohen and Dave Popkin he thought the Pirates should have been up by “13 or 14” by halftime, it hardly mattered.
Xavier had one mini-rally, a 6-0 run capped by two Adam Kunkel free throws with 12:37 left. That cut the deficit to 55-49. But Jamir Harris then worked a pick-and-roll with Tyrese Samuel, who scored, and Harris then hit a pullup jumper for a 59-49 lead.
“Jamir made two great plays,” Willard said. Harris had only two points and two assists, but those plays were huge at that juncture to keep Xavier from regaining any traction.
Seton Hall led by as many as 19 on its way to its fourth straight win at Xavier.
“It's just a big win this time of year on the road,” Willard said.
As for Rhoden’s virtuoso performance, which also included six rebounds and a plus-minus of plus-18, the coach simply said, “Jared Rhoden playing like Jared Rhoden.”
And make no mistake. Now that February is over for the Pirates, they will need more of the same from Rhoden in March to keep this show going.
