The Musketeers had been rolling toward a potential top 25 ranking just a week ago. But an eight point home loss to Seton Hall on the heels of a road loss at Providence has them trending downwards on message boards as they wander into Philadelphia tonight.
Xavier’s bench was outscored 25-7 on Saturday and that performance has been indicative of a general lack of production all season.This team ranks in the top 30 nationally in offensive efficiency, but that doesn’t do their overall offense justice.
Outside of stud point guard Semaj Christon and junior center Matt Stainbrook, there are not explosive scorers on this roster. They do several other things quite well, namely in the rebounding department.
But their offense is not up to speed with where it should be at this time, and if you look at their resume in total, they have not defeated any quality offensive opponents all year. Tennessee back on November 12 was a decent win, but nothing special.
Villanova, as illustrated in their second half beat down at Temple on Saturday, is an explosive team. They have great guard depth and plenty of bodies to throw at Christon. They play at a very similar pace to the Musketeers here. They also have more interior depth than Xavier, although that is not saying much.
This number posted at 10 and has since moved down to 9.5 on some books. That’s right about where I expected this to be, and that number gives ‘Nova the necessary respect they deserve at this point in the season.
While Xavier is a decent ball club that should still end up in the tournament come March (and getting double digit points here may look appetizing), this Villanova team is simply a bad match-up for Xavier. They are more athletic than their opponent they do not shoot the ball from deep well enough to take advantage of Villanova’s primary weakness.
At the same time, you have to figure the Musketeers get up for this game given their last two shortcomings. I’ll be interested to see if they can keep pace here, but it’s going to be a tough go around given how well the Wildcats play defense as a team.
