By: Josh Abrams
Olney - As we approach the end of November and beginning of December, it is starting to become very apparent who is separating themselves from the others in Big-5 basketball.
The Villanova Wildcats left no doubts about that in their wire-to-wire, 70-55 victory over the La Salle Explorers at John Glaser Arena . It was as balanced of a performance as it could be from the visitors; four 'Nova players finished with double figures in the scoring department, five players recorded two or more assists and six players added a steal. Redshirt freshman forward Matt Hodge was the offensive leader for Villanova, scoring 17 points on an efficient 7-9 shooting and 3-5 from beyond the arc, while junior guard and Penn transfer Tyler Perkins added 13 points, five rebounds and three assists.
Any Big-5 game held at whichever venue around the city holds significant importance. It's not very often that Villanova makes the half-hour or so trek from the Main Line to Broad & Olney when they play La Salle, so even for somebody like Hodge (who does not hail from around here), the game still meant an awful lot to him and his teammates.
"(Tonight) felt good," said the Limburg, Belgium native. "Good win for the team. It was an important Big-5 game; we take those really serious."
Villanova is under new leadership for the 2025-26 season after three years led by Kyle Neptune saw the Wildcats miss out on the NCAA tournament each of those campaigns. Kevin Willard spent 12 seasons as the head coach at Seton Hall, guiding the Pirates to five March Madness appearances and a Big East Conference Tournament championship in 2016, when he beat the team he is now taking over for the first time.
"Being part of (the Big-5) tradition is really special," said Willard. "Philadelphia basketball, whether if it's high school, college, NBA - has that unbelievable tradition. Great players, great teams. To finally be part of it is really special."
Villanova HC Kevin Willard, players Matt Hodge and Tyler Perkins speak to media following 70-55 win over La Salle (Video by Josh Abrams for PSD)
First half highlights from Nova-La Salle at Glaser Arena; teams exchange baskets after Nova gets out to 9-0 lead, Hodge triple closes out the half (Video by Josh Abrams)
Hodge could not have been any more perfect in the first half, scoring 11 points on 4-4 shooting and three triples. Perkins provided a solid 8/3/2 points/rebounds/assists line, and in addition Villanova also received major contributions from senior forward Duke Brennan (four points and six boards, four of them on the offensive end) and freshman guard Acaden Lewis (solid 6/4/3 stat line). Brennan currently sports the best rebounding numbers in the nation, averaging just under 15 per game and grabbing the most offensive boards of any player.
Nova got out to a quick 9-0 lead and essentially never looked back. Their largest lead blossomed to 14 in the first half and eventually 20 in the second half, but La Salle deserves credit for hanging tough in the first 20 minutes and not letting the score get too far away from them.
The guard duo of Eric Acker and Rob Dockery led the charge on offense (scoring eight points apiece on their way to 17 and 13 for the game, respectively) and kept the Explorers within striking distance for as long as they could. La Salle was able to cut Villanova's lead down to four at one point in the late stages of the first half. But the backbreaker came at the very end when Hodge begged for the ball at the top of the key and promptly drilled his third triple with very few seconds left and put Nova back up by nine. Not an insurmountable deficit, by any means, but La Salle head coach Darris Nichols understood the nature of the beast he was tasked with trying to take down.
"Early in the first half - majority of the game - too many offensive rebounds," expressed the first year head coach who spent the prior four seasons coaching at Radford. "We continue to do (this), and I continue to talk to the guys - we had a lot of self-inflicted wounds sometimes... you gotta clean it up, in a hurry. If we do those things we'll get better. But I feel like we fought better, we had some guys step up. We've just got to continue to work."
It is clear that Nichols has quite the work to do in order to get his Explorers to where they want to be, which presumably is atop the A-10 with any sort of chance at making noise when the 14 teams gather at PPG Paints Arena (home of the Pittsburgh Penguins) in March. And while it is fair to want to give him some time since he is only coaching in his first handful of games at 20th & Olney, he just alluded to how he has to figure things out sooner rather than later, and not let early obstacles define how a game should play out.
"I thought that the physicality from (Villanova) to start off; not really shocked us but took a toll on us early, and then we responded," Nichols said. "But you can't get down (on yourself) like that... they came out swinging and I thought they did a good job. I like their team, their makeup and how they play."
La Salle HC Darris Nichols addresses media following tough 15-point loss to Villanova, discusses what his team needs to do better moving forward (Video by Josh Abrams)
Second-half highlights from Villanova/La Salle; Wildcats start to pull away and put game out of reach. Lewis and Perkins respond to Marshall trey with baskets forcing La Salle to call timeout (Video by Josh Abrams)
The victory for Villanova improves their record to 4-1 overall, and they are now on a four-game win streak after falling to BYU - a top-10 team in the nation - to open their season. More importantly, it sets them up for a chance to clinch the other berth in the Big-5 championship match which is set for December 6th at Xfinity Mobile Arena. They will only be able to do so if they defeat Temple the Monday before, on December 1st at home.
The loss for La Salle drops their record to 2-3, and they are in a little bit of a slump as they've lost their last three contests. Their next time on the court against a Division One opponent will come on Black Friday when they open the Cathedral Classic at the Palestra against Hofstra.