My first job in high school was cleaning bathrooms at a state park campground. Camping is a foul enough activity, but what people did in those bathrooms defies explanation. I say this to let you know I have stared into the dark heart of a man experiencing a bowel emergency and apparently the desire to do snow angels at the same time. I’ve cleaned up when someone went into a bathroom and seemed to have both violently vomited and done multiple 360s.
This Xavier game might have been worse. The Musketeers lost a single half by 29 points.
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The Musketeers came out and looked like the kind of team they have been all year: very capable for playing with NCAA tournament teams for long stretches. They shot the ball decently, rebounded decently, and watched Tre Carroll score 22. The Musketeers were up 11 at the half and had flirted with pushing the lead even higher. Sure, there were warning signs like Seton Hall’s 12 offensive rebounds, but Seton Hall is so wretched at shooting the ball that they collect a lot of offensive rebounds. It’s just what they do.
Xavier was shooting 56.7% from the floor, 12-17 at the rim, and had turned the Pirates over eight times. It wasn’t pretty, but it had been effective. You figured they’d fix the three point shooting, tidy up some of their own sloppiness, and hang in the game. No one was foolhardy enough to think this team would run away and hide, but they had done enough to be competitive. Even by the end of the game, Xavier had spent more time leading than trailing by over six minutes.
That effectiveness would not repeat itself in the second half. It would be stupid to sit here and rail about the coach, he’s doing a solid job and has a clear plan. It would be stupid to sit here and whine that the team is soft, they obviously aren’t. There is no denying that Xavier was terrible in the second half today. Is it taking the Lord’s name in vain to say they were God awful? I hope not, because they were.
In the second half Xavier allowed SHU to shoot .563/.571/.762 in the second half. The Pirates are a terrible offensive team. They came into this game 161st in the nation. Those shooting numbers are so far above their normal average it barely merits mention. Even the Seton Hall players must have been stunned to see the ball go through the net so many times. Seton Hall shot 21 free throws in the second half alone, and this wasn’t a poorly officiated game. They only managed nine offensive rebounds this half, but then they only missed 14 shots and four free throws. In an entire half of basketball Xavier collected just seven defensive boards.
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Coach Pitino said his team was “punked.” That’s likely an understatement. This was a spanking. It was a slightly above average team absolutely bludgeoning a mediocre one. Xavier isn’t a bad team, they just aren’t anywhere near good enough to compete in the Big East. In the MAC they’d be right with Miami or Akron at the top of the table. They don’t play in the MAC though. In the Big East you have to ready to compete when the other team finds another gear. Xavier wasn’t tonight. The coach explained exactly what he told them at halftime. It’s what you would have told them at halftime. It didn’t matter. Seton Hall was aggressive and physical and Xavier folded.
This season isn’t over. By and large, it has been fun to watch. Tonight was not. Tonight was what happens when a team just gets exposed. Xavier has the occasional half this season when everything goes wrong and they cannot course correct. Roddie Anderson is lovable and exciting, he cannot calm a team down. All Wright is a good scorer, he cannot calm a team down. Malik Messina-Moore could not calm himself down. There is no steadying influence on this team beyond Filip Borovicanin, and he picked a very bad night to have a very bad game. Tre Carroll had six turnovers. You might survive that if Big Fil doesn’t chip in five of his own.
Coach Pitino tried, but really who is the answer to this? Anthony Robinson turns it over too much in calm games. Pape N’Diaye somehow played 11 minutes without grabbing a single rebound, a stat all the more ignominious for being the only player to mange more than garbage time minutes and not get a board. Isaiah Walker was actually quite good off the bench, defensive struggles aside. Beyond that, there is no one. Mier Panoam is a rumor. Gabriel Pozzatto is not even that.
There will be better days ahead. Xavier will continue to push the better teams and it’s entirely possible that they pull of a victory in one of those games. Tonight, though, was rough. For 20 minutes Xavier showed flashes of what they could be. Unfortunately, it was the other 20 minutes that decided the game.
