PirateCrew: Seton Hall Pirates Football & Basketball Recruiting
The definitive source for all PirateCrew news.
By JP Pelzman
Seton Hall’s NET ranking dropped only one notch Thursday morning, from 33 to 34.
That’s the good news.
The bad news--well, there was plenty of that. The Pirates missed out on yet another opportunity to grab a Quad 1 victory for their NCAA Tournament resume, losing to No. 24 (and No. 18 NET) UConn, 70-65 at Gampel Pavilion in Storrs, Conn on Wednesday.
But worse yet, Seton Hall coach Kevin Willard was as pessimistic as he has been yet when he spoke with broadcasters Gary Cohen and Dave Popkin on the 970 AM postgame radio show about the status of point guard Bryce Aiken (concussion), who hasn’t played since Jan. 15.
“I’m not, unfortunately,” Willard said when Cohen asked if he expected Aiken to return. “This is something that, we’ve seen every specialist and everything. Concussions, you just never know. It’s just something that unfortunately for him, he was just playing at such a high level, having a great year, working really hard.
“He has not practiced,” Willard continued. “I haven’t seen any improvement. … But it’s been a month, almost five weeks. I just don’t see it happening.”
Not that he hasn’t been doing it already, but maybe it’s time for Willard to stop planning for Aiken to return and put on a cape. Instead, perhaps the best way to proceed, as Willard indicated in that interview, would be to plan on Aiken not being there. And if he somehow does come back, it’s a bonus.
In the meantime, tweaks need to be made to a struggling Pirates’ offense.
How about less iso?
Yes, this is anathema to Willard, whose offense is based on NBA concepts such as isolation, pick-and-roll and pro-style spacing.
But Aiken was their best iso player. And as Willard said on the radio, “Not having another (point) guard is killing us.”
Well-said. Richmond actually was 6-for-13 for 13 points against the Huskies (18-7, 9-5 Big East), but the problem often is that all of his ballhandling chores sometimes make it difficult for Richmond to “get his,” if you will, on offense, especially late in the game. That’s unfortunate, because he can score in iso.
As for Jared Rhoden, he is having his issues. The plan was for Rhoden to be The Man in the iso offense, in the mold of Isaiah Whitehead, Khadeen Carrington, Myles Powell and Sandro Mamukelashvili. However, Rhoden’s shooting percentage has fallen from 42.9% last season to 39.1% this year, and his two-point percentage is down from 50.8 to 42.7.
The mid-range game simply is not cost-effective, so to speak, at that percentage. Something must change.
Get Jamir Harris more shots.
Harris is 18-for-41 (43.9%) from long range in The Hall’s last seven games, but perhaps getting him involved early would help even more. The problem is that Harris does not fit into the iso game.
Yes, he can hit an occasional stepback, but catch-and-shoot is where Harris truly shines. However, Willard is hamstrung again by Aiken’s absence because Harris must be the secondary ballhandler behind Richmond, which does limit some of his shooting chances.
Take care of business at home
Seton Hall (15-9, 6-8) has three remaining home games--against DePaul (12-12, 3-11) on Saturday at 8 p.m., Butler (13-13, 6-9) on Wednesday and Georgetown (6-19, 0-14) on March 2. A loss to any of these teams would be disastrous, of course.
It remains to be seen if the city of Newark will rescind its vaccination and/or mask mandates soon. That definitely would help the attendance at the Prudential Center.
As for the two road games, Xavier (Feb. 26) and Creighton (March 5) won’t be easy. But Xavier, which saw its NET drop from 20- to 23 with a home loss to St. John’s on Wednesday, is far from unbeatable in Cincinnati.
In fact, the Pirates have won there three consecutive years.
“We’ve built up a lot of credit for the way we’ve played in the non-conference schedule,” Willard said. “We’ve had a tough go with it with injuries that really hurt us. … It’s made practice a little difficult. But I’m making sure these guys still have a long(-term) vision. We have three games at home, two more on the road, two tough places to play, but our opportunities are there.”
Now they must make them count.
