Hot-shooting Wildcats blitz Sooners to reach final
> VILLANOVA 95 > OKLAHOMA 51
HOUSTON— At Villanova, the Wildcats’ 1985 NCAA title victory over Georgetown and Patrick Ewing is the stuff of legend, a performance widely known as “The Perfect Game.”
Saturday night at NRG Stadium, the current Wildcats woke up those echoes with a shooting performance for the ages in a runaway 95-51 victory over Oklahoma in the national semifinals. Villanova shot 71.4 per cent from the field (35-for-49) and became the first team from the Big East since it reorganized three years ago to reach the NCAA title game.
Josh Hart had a brilliant game for Villanova (34-5), scoring 23 points, shooting 10-for-12 and adding eight rebounds and four assists. Senior point guard Ryan Arcidiacono was equally efficient with 15 points and 5-for-6 shooting.
Oklahoma’s Buddy Hield, who was the leading scorer in the nation this season, was held to just nine points and 4-for-12 shooting, including a 1for-8 effort from three-point range.
One major line of questioning prior to the Final Four opener was about the difficulty of shooting in a massive domed arena, where depth perception is difficult because the playing court is in the middle of a football field and is surrounded by vast space amid stands that slope gently backward rather than the more intimate feel of a normal basketball arena.
Hield said he could shoot anywhere and would have “no excuses” and, when he dropped a three-point attempt to open the scoring, the tournament’s leading scorer with a 29.3 average seemed poised to back up his bold talk.
But Hield struggled against Villanova’s aggressive, switching man-toman defence. He was limited to seven first-half points and 3-for-8 shooting.