Editorial: The Uncomfortable ConversationA permalink to Monday's editorial is available below:The Uncomfortable ConversationEwing: "I'm Hoping I'll Be Back"Post-game comments from head coach Patrick Ewing:
Connecticut 86, Georgetown 77
Don't let the final score fool you--this was never in doubt.R.J. Cole scored 18 points as Connecticut took easy care of Georgetown 86-77, a game that was close only in the stat-stuffing department, where the Hoyas scored 13 points in the final 2:01, but to no effect.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
While there were no seniors on the 2021-22 roster due to previous transfers by James Akinjo, Grayson Carter, Josh LeBlanc, and Mac McClung, a pre-game ceremony was held for grad transfers Donald Carey and Kaiden Rice. For now, they are the only scheduled departures from the roster. Winners of its last four, the Huskies came out tentative to begin the game. Early foul trouble to center Adama Sanogo, with two personal fouls in the first three minutes of play, seed to rattle UConn, while giving up four turnovers. Georgetown made six consecutive shots, with eight of Georgetown's first 11 points coming from Carey, and Georgetown regained a 13-12 lead on a dunk inside by Timothy Ighoefe with 12:57 in the first period. As the Huskies began to tighten its interior defense, the Hoyas went outside, without success, and lost the momentum of the game. Georgetown missed its next six attempts from three point range, including an awkward segment where it missed three consecutive in a 57 second period, maintained by there offensive rebounds from sophomore Kobe Clark, seeing his most minutes of the entire season. Second chance baskets by Jordan Hawkins, Andre jackson, and Tyrese Martin gave UConn a 20-14 lead with 8:36 to play, but it was a run of back to back threes from Tyler Polley and Isaiah Whaley that blew open the game and put the Huskies up by double digits, a lead that never was seriously challenged thereafter. Georgetown ended the half shooting 2 of its final 17 attempts, trailing 41-26 at the half. R.J. Cole was the story for the Uconn in the second half, opening with 10 of the Huskies' first 15 points and both teams opened the second half with much better shooting: UConn shot 70 percent in the first seven minutes, Georgetown 75 percent. Baskets by Collin Holloway and Ryan Mutombo closed the gap slight to 60-46 midway in the second half, but another back to back volley by Whaley and Cole quickly extended the lead to 20, 66-46. Hanging around at the foul line was a poor consolation for the Hoyas, which went nearly five minutes without a basket as UConn entered garbage time up 22, and following Sanogo's fifth foul at the 3:08 mark began to bench its starters. A three from Dante Harris and free throws from Aminu Mohammed cut the deficit to 17 with 2:01 to play, and Ewing opted for the flash press, which forced four turnovers in the next 1:05, forcing an exasperated UConn coach Dan Hurley to bring in his starters after Georgetown had scored 10 straight and cut the lead to nine, 81-72. Although the outcome was not in doubt, the Huskies built the lead back to 13 with 33 seconds before baskets by Harris and Mohammed brought the final under single digits, but not enough to forestall an 18th consecutive loss. Dante Harris led all Georgetown scorers with 23 points, all in the second half. He contributed just one assist in the game, and none in the second half. Aminu Mohammed did not score a single basket in this game until two in the final 1:06 of play, and scored 12 of his 16 points at the line. The game showed little from the bench. Freshmen Tyler Beard and Jalin Billingsley combined for just seven minutes without points, Kobe Clark saw only three minutes in the second half after an enthusiastic first half, and Kaiden Rice continued to fall further down the list of three point options for the Hoyas, finishing 0 for 3. Rice, now a shocking 2 for 33 from there point range over the last four games, played only two minutes in the second half. Georgetown shot 60 percent for the second half, but its first half stumble was never overcome. UConn was generous in fouls (25) and turnovers (16) in this game, but GU could never take advantage. Cole's 18 led all UConn scorers while the Hoyas were otherwise spared the wrath of Adama Sanogo, who played just 18 minutes and scored only six points before fouling out. "Even with this adversity, you always have to believe and always continue to do the work that it takes to break out of this," Ewing said in post game remarks." If the losing ways break, it will have to be on the road, where Georgetown is 0-9 in 2021-22, returning to the Prudential Center Wednesday versus Seton Hall. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 37 4-6 3-4 6-7 2 1 3 23
Carey 36 4-6 1-5 2-2 0 0 2 13
Mohammed 35 2-8 0-2 12-16 5 1 2 16
Holloway 26 4-5 0-2 3-5 3 1 2 11
Ighoefe 19 2-3 0-0 0-0 6 1 4 4
Reserves:
Beard 5 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0 1 0
Billingsley 2 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Rice 9 0-1 0-3 0-0 0 0 3 0
Mutombo 11 3-6 0-0 3-3 2 0 0 9
Clark 11 0-0 0-0 0-0 3 2 1 0
Wilson 8 0-0 0-0 1-2 2 0 0 1
DNP: Azinge, Muresan, Bristol
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 2
TOTALS 200 19-36 4-16 27-35 25 6 18 77
PTI On GeorgetownFrom ESPN's Pardon The Interruption: a frank discussion on the 2021-22 Georgetown Hoyas."We move now to Georgetown, "said Tony Kornheiser, "which was once a very, very big deal in college basketball. The Hoyas lost their 17th game in a row last night when they were beaten at home by DePaul, which was also a very, very big deal in college basketball, once upon a time. Georgetown is now 6-21 overall, 0-16 in the Big East. They are coached by their greatest player, Patrick Ewing...do you expect Georgetown to ride this out?"The Lost Class of 2022
There will be no Senior Day this Sunday against Connecticut. The grad transfers may be recognized, as is custom, but the recruiting class of 2018 marked the first Georgetown class in 29 years to have all four freshmen transfer before their senior season.
THE CLASS OF 2022
Three of the four were members of the Class of 2022 Big East All-Rookie team and had helped lead Ewing to his first winning season in 2018-19; all four were gone a year later. In the intervening two years, Georgetown is a combined 19-34."My staff and I are pleased to add these talented young men to our roster," said Ewing in a 2017 release upon the signing of letters of intent from Grayson Carter, Josh LeBlanc, and Mac McClung, with James Akinjo signing in the spring. "I feel that all three can make an immediate impact to our program and I look forward to coaching them next season." "#Mackinjo has been getting quite a bit of play so far this young season, and for good reason," wrote Ava Wallace of the Washington Post in a feature article in December 2018. "The pair entered Georgetown as perhaps the most buzzed-about freshman backcourt since 2007, when McDonald's all-Americans Chris Wright and Austin Freeman signed with the Hoyas. More broadly, the duo is part of Georgetown's most exciting freshman class in years alongside four-star forward Josh LeBlanc." "But while Akinjo, McClung and LeBlanc are still developing and the Hoyas are far from perfect ...the [freshmen] have put Georgetown (9-3) on the right path when it comes to earning on-court victories as well as national relevance," she wrote. Such relevance seems distant today. The first recruit to the Class of 2022 was also its first to leave. Grayson Carter was a 6-8 power forward from Dallas who committed in the summer of 2017 and at one time was the 10th ranked center in the nation, but when he arrived at the Hilltop he was immediately parked on the bench, seeing action in just 14 games with a 1.1 points per game average. After sitting out the 2019-20 season, he reappeared at Texas-Arlington averaging 3.4 points per game in limited action, then transferred at the end of the 2020-21 season for Texas Southern, where he is sitting out a second year due to transfer, with one year of eligibility remaining. The next two players left in rapid order. James Akinjo was the 2018-19 Big East Rookie Of The Year, averaging 13.4 points per game on the only team in the Ewing era with a winning record (19-14). Akinjo was a gifted scorer and floor leader, but apparently clashed with Ewing and was reported to be at odds with the attention being paid to teammate Mac McClung. Akinjo was visibly disinterested in a early season loss in November 2019 to UNC-Greensboro, and two days later, Georgetown announced that Akinjo had been dismissed from the team along with Josh LeBlanc, but GU retracted the claim less than 48 hours later to say he was transferring and was not affiliated with the issues facing LeBlanc. Akinjo transferred to Arizona, where he was an All-Pac-12 selection averaging 15.6 points per game, but was on the move once again, where he is now a senior at Baylor, averaging 12.9 points per game. The departure of forward Josh LeBlanc marked a public low in the Ewing era. A lanky forward with as much pro potential as anyone on the roster, LeBlanc averaged nine points a game as a freshman and was named to the Big East All-Rookie team. Six games into his sophomore season, LeBlanc was kicked off the team following the disclosure that LeBlanc was the subject of a criminal complaint filed in September for assault and burglary of a fellow Georgetown student. LeBlanc transferred out of school prior to a pending student judicial hearing, and the criminal charges were dropped following a police investigation. LeBlanc transferred to LSU but never approached his early potential at Georgetown, where he averaged just 3.2 points per game on the bench in 2020-21, and then transferred to Alabama-Birmingham in 2021-22, averaging 4.6 points as a reserve. He is currently listed as a junior at UAB. Matthew (Mac) McClung was the most visible of the four, and the last to leave. The leading scorer in Virginia high school history, McClung's signing with Georgetown raised curiosity and interest in the program. A Big East All-Rookie and All-Academic selection, McClung averaged 13.1 points as a freshman and 15.7 as a sophomore, but transferred after the end of the 2019-20 season, hinting he was unhappy with the way the training staff addressed a series of injuries he suffered during that season. McClung transferred to Texas Tech where he was Big 12 Rookie of The Year, averaging 15.5 points per game, and left Texas Tech after his junior season for a pro contract, currently averaging 21 points in the Los Angeles Lakers' developmental system. There is no way to forecast where Georgetown basketball would be if these four had stayed together, but it is apparent it would not be where this team is today. The Man Behind The Curtain
The basketball blog Hilltop Hoops alleges the concentric circles of the Georgetown basketball office tie to a former assistant coach with considerable influence in the struggling program.
FEATURE COVERAGE
According to Hilltop Hoops, Ronny Thompson (C'92) performs a significant role guiding the program. Thompson, the son of former coach John Thompson and younger brother of former coach John Thompson III, has been involved with the Georgetown program for parts of the last 30 years: first, as a walk-on under his father for four seasons, then hired by his father as an assistant coach in 1998 before the elder Thompson resigned a year later. An assistant for four years under Craig Esherick, Thompson left abruptly when Esherick was given a contract extension, taking an assistant coaching role at Arkansas and later being named head coach at Ball State in 2007, but resigned under fire one year later. A decade later, upon John Thompson III's departure and Ewing's arrival as head coach, Thompson joined the basketball office along with Bill Howze, Thompson's former assistant at Ball State, who was named Ewing's director of basketball operations. The article claims Thompson's arrival was initiated by his late father and that Ronny plays a larger role within the program than those outside the program are made aware of. "He tried to meddle in other staff members' work, even though they didn't report to him," a former member of the program told the article's author, Aidan Curran. "Everyone was qualified to do their jobs, but Ronny created an unorthodox system that led to a lot of frustration for several people." The article also alleges that Thompson's role led to the departure of sports information director Lori Hamamoto, who Ewing installed as SID when he arrived in 2017 and who departed midway in the 2018-19 season. "I feel Ronny had lots of influence, especially when Big John was around," said another source, unnamed. "Ronny made it seem that he was second in charge, behind Coach Ewing." Thompson's employment status with the program has never been publicly disclosed. The article was amended Friday with this statement: "New information received today from a Georgetown University employee with knowledge of Thompson's employment status revealed that Thompson is listed by the university as a 'salaried ongoing (regular) employee'". However, he is still not listed as a member of the athletic department as listed on the department's web site, and has never been publicly identified in media notes or other basketball releases as being on staff. DePaul 68, Georgetown 65
Javon Freeman-Liberty scored his team's final five points as the DePaul Blue Demons extended the Georgetown losing streak to 17 in a 68-65 win at Capital One Arena Thursday night.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
This was a matchup between the two worst teams in the Big East and the first half lived up to it, and less. By the time of the first media timeout, Georgetown had five points and four turnovers, and much of the half was spent watching each team hand the ball back to the other. An early Georgetown lead in the first half was on back to back baskets by freshman Aminu Mohammed to lead 5-4, but Georgetown was late on defense on a number of possessions and sent the Blue Demons frequently to the line. For its part, DePaul was just as generous in the giveaway department, leading by only one until back to back threes by Jalen Terry and Philemon Gebrewhit fed a 12-0 DePaul run and an 11 point lead with 6:04 to play. Back to back threes by Donald Carey and Jalin Billingsley quickly brought the Hoyas within five, but Georgetown settled for a 30-26 deficit at the break, in a ugly first half that saw the teams combine for 19 field goals and 21 turnovers. Freeman-Liberty was held to just eight points at the break on 2 for 6 shooting, but his arrival after halftime was just what DePaul needed, down to just seven scholarship players due to injuries. The Blue Demons had been effective on containing Georgetown's guard play, as Carey and Dante Harris were a combined 2 for 11 in the first half. Lacking an outside touch, Georgetown went inside to seldom-used center Malcolm Wilson, who scored seven of the team's first nine points of the half and contracted the DePaul defense enough to allow Carey his first points of the second half: a three at the 15:41 mark, 38-37. A Dante Harris steal on DePaul's next possession set up a Collin Holloway layup, and Georgetown now owned an encouraging 40-37 lead. A tight game followed for the next four minutes, but Georgetown looked to have regained momentum midway in the half when Carey connected a four point play at the 11:17 mark, then a basket to put the Hoyas up five, 50-45. The Demons fought back to tie the score before Carey, fouled in the act of shooting a three, sank all three free throws at the 7:15 mark, 53-50. It was time for Freeman-Liberty to deliver, with a pair of steals and two layups in short order to give DePaul a 56-53 lead. An Aminu Mohammed layup closed the count to three, but an unlikely three from Depaul forward Brandon Johnson, who had made just two thee pointers in his last four games combined, put DePaul up six, 61-55. Down six with 3:15 to play, the Hoyas rallied. A jumper by Jalin Billingsley closed to four. A flash press forced a turnover and Aminu Mohammed drove inside for a three point play, 62-61. A split at the foul line gave DePaul a 63-61 lead when Billingsley hit a three with the shot clock expiring to wow the small Capital One Arena crowd and give Georgetown a crucial lead at the 2:15 mark, 64-63.
Things were heating up. On the next series, Freeman-Liberty's shot was deflected by Carey, but the Hoyas missed consecutive shots under the basket and fouled Freeman-Liberty, where, in a second half of missed opportunities at the line, he hit one of two, 64-64. Seventeen seconds later it was Mohammed's turn to do the same, hitting the first and missing the second, 65-64. Freeman-Liberty wasted no time on the next drive, driving the lane to put DePaul up to stay.
Down one with one minute remaining, Georgetown had all the opportunities but none of the fortune. Needing two but settling for the three, Carey missed twice from long range, the second of which sent Freeman-Liberty back to the line. This time, he hit both attempts, 68-65, providing the Hoyas one more chance with 30 seconds left. Instead, fans witnessed more than one chance--a wild finish. Looking quickly for three, Kaiden Rice launched an errant shot, but Mohammed grabbed the rebound. Passing up two, he swung the ball to Billingsley, who missed from the left corner. Freeman-Liberty was stripped from the rebound, giving Billingsley another chance that sailed long. The rebound was also lost, landing near halfcourt where Dante Harris sent up a long shot after the horn. It missed too. In the final 2:15, Georgetown missed its last seven shots of what is likely the most winnable gamer left on its schedule. "We just didn't execute our plays," said head coach Patrick Ewing in post-game comments. "I thought we didn't execute our plays." "We've been in some close possession games and they haven't come out in our favor so that's something we really focused in on in the last week of practice, finishing and executing," Said DePaul coach Tony Stubblefield, as relayed by Hilltop Hoops. "With 30 seconds when we made that last free throw to go up three, I thought there was too much time to foul in that situation...They did get three looks but I thought our guys scrambled hard to contest those shots." Freeman-Liberty, who did not play in the first meeting between the schools, finished with 25 points, 17 in the second half. The Blue Demons also got a strong effort from reserve center Yor Anei, with nine points and three rebounds. The DePaul free throw shooting was lacking (18 for 28) but with nine more attempts than GU, it counted just the same. Aminu Mohammed (18) and Donald Carey (15) led the Hoyas, with big contributions from Malcolm Wilson early in the second and Jalin Billingsley late in that half. Dante Harris was held to 2 for 10 from the field and Kaiden Rice was 0 for 4, including the late attempt to tie the score. The Hoyas shot 38 percent for the game but its 3 for 13 three point shooting after halftime were 10 missed opportunities in a game that literally came down to two possessions. The final home game of the season is Sunday versus Connecticut. With the loss, Georgetown has clinched the last seed in the Big East tournament for the first time in school history. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 34 2-8 0-2 0-0 3 4 2 4
Carey 38 1-5 3-9 4-5 4 3 1 15
Mohammed 33 5-12 1-2 5-7 9 1 4 18
Holloway 26 3-4 0-1 0-0 6 0 5 6
Wilson 12 3-3 0-0 3-5 3 0 0 9
Reserves:
Beard 3 0-0 0-0 0-0 1 0 0 0
Billingsley 21 2-4 2-4 0-0 2 0 3 10
Ighoefe 3 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 1 0
Rice 14 0-1 0-3 0-0 0 1 0 0
Mutombo 14 1-2 0-0 1-2 3 0 2 3
DNP: Azinge, Clark, Bristol, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 5
TOTALS 200 17-39 6-21 13-19 36 9 18 65
Attendance: 4,028
The cost of the losing streak continues to be seen in decades-low attendance figures. An announced crowd of 4,028 attended Thursday's game with DePaul.
Did Georgetown Extend Patrick Ewing's Contract?
In the midst of its worst season in 50 years, a report Sunday claims that Georgetown University officials quietly extended Patrick Ewing's contract last season but failed to disclose it to the general public."Georgetown rewarded Patrick Ewing with a contract extension following last season's run to the Big East Tournament title and the NCAA Tournament," writes Jon Rothstein at FanDuel, citing "multiple sources"."Exact terms of the extension and how much of it is guaranteed is still unknown." The leak to Rothstein came during a recent period where Ewing's record come under increased scrutiny from articles at ESPN, the New York Post, and the Washington City Paper. "I think Ewing is a quality coach who cares deeply about Georgetown basketball. I just don't believe college is for him," wrote the New York Post's Zach Braziller, who mentioned an extension in his Feb. 7 article. "I doubt Georgetown would outright fire the legendary player, especially after giving him a contract extension last April. But an amicable parting ways would be the best thing for both parties." In 2021, Hilltop Hoops reported having viewed a copy of the contract, copies of which would otherwise be held by the University and Ewing's agent, David Falk, who previously represented John Thompson and John Thompson III. The source of the contract was not disclosed. "The article reports the 2017 contract was a six year, $18.6 million guaranteed base for Ewing through April 4, 2023, the day after the 2023 Final Four," we wrote. "This term ties to a report from ESPN.com which called the Georgetown deal "a rare six-year contract to restore its basketball glory."  If an extension was signed, this news was not made public as previous extensions had been. In 2003, an extension for Craig Esherick was seen as controversial coming off a 19-15 season, which was seen in some quarters as under performing for a team of Georgetown's stature. Georgetown has made no public comment regarding an extension or the absence thereof. Villanova 74, Georgetown 66 In four years as a student-athlete at Georgetown University, Patrick Ewing was a part of just 20 regular season losses. Today, as head coach, he suffered his 20th regular season loss in a single season.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
Despite a great effort by the Hoyas, a wobbly #10 Villanova Wildcats team escaped with a 74-66 win at Finneran Pavilion, tested but not broken by one of Georgetown's best team efforts of the season."They're sticking together and really playing well, much respect for them," said Villanova coach Jay Wright. They're playing hard for Patrick. They played small and got us into a lot of mismatches. Defensively, they were physical and really got into us. We struggled but we gutted it out." This game was a rocky one for both teams. Georgetown opened the game shooting 2 for 11 and 0 for 5 from three point range - a knockout blow in most games this season, but its defense had forced much the same on the Wildcats, who stunned their Senior Day home crowd by opening 3 for 11 with five early fouls. Aided by free throws, the Cats took a 14-5 advantage in the first 10 minutes of play, and led by as many as 11 before back to back threes from Kaiden Rice and Donald Carey awoke the Hoyas and tightened the score to 16-12. Georgetown never led in this game, and each time they looked ready to seize momentum, Villanova answered the call. After a long miss by the Wildcats, the Hoyas looked to close to one on a Kaiden Rice three but it sailed wide and on its next possession, freshman Jordan Longino, who had only made four threes all season, hit the shot, 19-12. Georgetown stayed close thanks to Donald Carey, who had eight of Georgetown's first 12 points, and whose three at the 4:13 mark closed the Villanova lead to 19-18. The Wildcats answered with back to back baskets, and caught a break when Aminu Mohammed was assessed a technical foul for arguing a foul call, resulting in two for the foul and two for the technical, each deposited into the Villanova bank, 28-18. The Wildcats ended the first half on a 13-4 run to lead by ten, 32-22, holding the Hoyas to its fewest first half points since the season opener with Dartmouth. The first half box score was dismal for the homestanding Cats: 8 for 26 from the field, 3 for 15 from three, with leading scorers Collin Gillespie and Justin Moore a combined 2 for 15. Across the stat sheet, Georgetown shot just 27 percent, with Carey going 4 for 8 and the rest of the team a combined 4 for 21. Villanova led by a net gain of ten free throws over Georgetown, marking the difference at a halftime neither coach could be comfortable with. By contrast, the Hoyas came out on fire in the second, shooting 7 of its first nine to close to three, 43-40, at the 14:18 mark. On the next play, Dante Harris drove the lane and picked up an offensive foul, one of three critical series in the second half where the Hoyas closed but could not execute a play to narrow the gap further. This was a game where Ewing was using traps and full court pressure more effectively, and the Wildcats struggled at times to get the ball up the court. But when they took shots, they proved successful, and went on a 13-2 run punctuated by a Chris Arcidiacono three that put the Cats up 11 at the 11:46 mark, 53-42. Unlike previous second halves, the Hoyas did not wilt, and fought back. The Wildcats were held scoreless in its next three possessions, with baskets by Dante Harris, Aminu Mohammed, and Donald Carey to close to 53-48 at the 9:29 mark. But as Eric Dixon drive the lane, Timothy Ighoefe picked a cheap foul on a Villanova basket, 56-48, part of a poor effort all day from the junior center. Baskets by Carey and Ryan Mutombo closed to 56-53 in a run Georgetown was shooting 75 percent from the field, but after a defensive stop, Aminu Mohammed stepped on the sideline before taking a shot, and the Wildcats answered with five straight, 61-53. A three by Carey at the 4:07 mark closed to 65-60, but the Hoyas gave up a pair of second chance baskets, the latter on a foul by Kaiden Rice which gave Villanova a 70-60 lead with 2:04 remaining. Villanova shot poorly in this game (9 for 28 from three) with an uncharacteristic 15 turnovers, but despite Georgetown shooting 59 percent in the second half, ten second half turnovers proved a mortal wound in what would have been the biggest upset in the 100 year history of the series. "My kids, they fought the entire the game," said coach Ewing in post game remarks. "They competed, they did their best. It didn't work out for us, unfortunately." Donald Carey led the Hoyas with a career high 24 points, followed by 16 from Dante Harris. Timothy Ighoefe was a non-factor in this game, with no points and no rebounds in a total of six minutes of play. Kaiden Rice scored his first three and missed his remaining six attempts from deep. Rice's five points were part of just 11 points from the GU bench, as four starters played 32 or more minutes on the evening. In the end, each team had 24 field goals, but Georgetown was just 10 for 17 from the foul line compared to 17 of 19 for Villanova, a loss of seven points which could have been the difference late. The Wildcats missed their first foul shot, their last, and hit all 17 in-between. "Even though things are not going well for us right now, I still believe in Georgetown," said Ewing said. "I still believe in the Georgetown brand. I still believe that our day is coming."
The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 32 4-7 2-6 2-3 3 4 3 16
Carey 37 4-4 5-9 1-2 4 4 2 24
Mohammed 33 2-6 0-3 4-6 8 2 3 8
Holloway 35 2-6 0-0 3-6 2 0 1 7
Ighoefe 6 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0 4 0
Reserves:
Beard 8 0-1 0-0 0-0 2 1 0 0
Billingsley 5 0-0 0-0 0-0 2 0 1 0
Rice 32 1-1 1-7 0-0 2 1 3 5
Mutombo 8 3-5 0-0 0-0 2 0 0 6
Wilson 2 0-0 0-0 0-0 1 0 1 0
DNP: Azinge, Clark, Bristol, Muresan
Injured Riley
Team Rebounds 5
TOTALS 200 16-31 8-25 10-17 31 12 17 66
A One-Sided Rivalry For an example of where the Georgetown men's basketball program fell off the national map since 2013, look no further than its record versus Villanova over the last decade.Saturday's game was be the 20th meeting between the schools since the 2013 reconstitution of the Big East conference. Villanova has been nationally ranked in all 20 games, and has won 17 of the 20, the most wins against Georgetown by any opponent over a 20 game stretch since its series with Connecticut from 1994 to 2006. In that same period, Georgetown has been ranked just once against the Wildcats, a #24 ranking on Feb. 7, 2015, the last season it was nationally ranked at all.Since 2013, Villanova is a combined 128-30 (.808) in Big East play and 254-51 (.832) overall. Since 2013, Georgetown is a combined 58-100 (.368) in Big East play and 137-141(.494) overall.
Ewing Jr. Named Head Coach In Canada Georgetown alumnus and former director of basketball operations Patrick Ewing Jr. (C'08) has been named head coach and general manager of the Newfoundland Growlers of the Canadian Elite Basketball League, per a release."I'm excited for this next opportunity in my coaching career, particularly getting to stay within the CEBL and join an organization that matches my ambitions in the Newfoundland Growlers", Ewing said in Friday's release. "The passionate basketball fan base in Newfoundland is desperate for a competitive, entertaining team to cheer for, and I'm ready to take on the challenge as general manager and head coach in providing just that. I can't wait to get started."The CEBL is a 10 team summer league which competes alongside the National Basketball League of Canada, which has dropped to four teams for the 2022-22 season. Ewing was an assistant coach with the CEBL's Ottawa Blackjacks last season. Marquette 77, Georgetown 66
Ten first half threes elevated the Marquette Warriors to an easy 77-66 win over Georgetown at Fiserv Forum, the Hoyas' record 15th consecutive loss.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
Marquette opened the game with a three pointer 19 seconds into the game, a sign of what was to come in a first half where Georgetown lasted nine minutes, before the roof fell in again. With both teams shooting tentatively from the floor, outside shots from Collin Holloway and Kaiden Rice gave the Hoyas a 19-17 lead at the 11:09 mark of the first half.
Reserve guard Greg Elliott came off the bench for back to back threes to regain the lead, 23-19, but GU answered the run with a dunk from Malcolm Wilson and two free throws from Aminu Mohammed, 23-all. Georgetown managed just one field goal in the next six minutes while Marquette ran unopposed. Freshman guard Kam Jones is the latest in a long line of Big East reserves who owes a career night to the Georgetown defense. Averaging seven points a game, Harris hit threes on four of Marquette's next five possessions, eluding Dante Harris and Donald Carey with ease and putting the Warriors up 11, 37-26 with 4:43 to halftime. Jones added a fifth three two minutes later, by which time the MU lead had grown to 16, 45-29, with a late three ending the first half 48-31. For a Marquette team which had not topped 10 threes in any game since January 19, it had 10 by halftime, shooting 51 percent from the field with 14 assists on 17 make baskets, a continuing indictment of Georgetown's inability to defend the pass. Georgetown ended the first half with one basket in the final 4:56, shooting 34 percent. If Jones was Mr. Outside in the first half, 6-10 center Kur Kuath was Mr. Inside after halftime. The Warriors scored the seven points of the second half, 55-31, with GU's first basket not coming until Holloway three pointer thee minutes in, 57-36. Kuath was 7 for 7 at short range as MU led by as many as 26 before settling for 12 minutes of garbage time that allowed the Hoyas to close the gap but not affect the outcome. The Warriors managed just four field goals in the final 12 minutes, a reflection of taking bad shots, settling for three pointers (missing its last nine attempts of the game) and allowing Georgetown some good looks inside, although the Hoyas were absolutely miserable from short range, shooting 9 for 36 (.250) from inside the arc. The Fox Sports 2 announcers were doing their best to maintain the audience. A deficit of "twenty points is nothing in college basketball," remarked Donny Marshall, except it was Georgetown he was talking about. Like clockwork, Georgetown's late game press arrived late. A slow but subsequent run brought the deficit to 12 with 2:56 to play, but Marquette answered with a driving dunk from Olivier Maxence-Prosper, 75-61. Holloway added free throws to close to 12 again, but Dante Harris airballed a three with 1:56 to play, and the Hoyas had run out of time again. "There was a point, just like every game, where we were right there," said head coach Patrick Ewing in post-game remarks. "And then bad offense for us leads to great offense for them." Kam Jones' 19 points in 17 minutes was a career high. George Mason transfer Tyler Kolek finished with 11 assists as the Warriors posted 26 assists on 30 baskets. Collin Holloway led the Hoyas with 15 points, while a 13 point, 17 rebound effort by Aminu Mohammed was sullied by a career low 3 for 19 from the field. Dante Harris continued his slide down the stat sheet, shooting 5 for 15, where he is now shooting 31 percent in Big East play and just 22 percent from three. Kaiden Rice was 1 for 8, the nominative leader for a Georgetown bench which shot a combined 3 for 15. "The only thing I can control is giving them a good game plan to go out and compete," Ewing said. "For the most part I thought we competed today, we just fell short." The 14th consecutive Big East loss is the third longest streak in Big East history behind the 18 consecutive losses by DePaul in the 2008-09 season (0-18) under former coach Jerry Wainwright and the 0-18 finish of the 1993-94 Miami Hurricanes under Leonard Hamilton. The current streak ties IUPUI for the second longest active streak in Division I behind Delaware State (18). The Hoyas travel to Villanova Saturday for its fourth game in seven days. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 36 3-7 2-5 2-2 4 5 1 14
Carey 35 1-3 4-10 0-0 4 5 2 14
Mohammed 35 2-16 1-3 6-6 17 1 2 13
Holloway 31 0-1 3-7 6-6 4 3 1 15
Wilson 15 1-2 0-0 0-0 4 0 1 2
Reserves:
Beard 13 0-1 0-1 1-2 2 0 0 1
Billingsley 7 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0 1 0
Ighoefe 8 2-3 0-0 0-0 4 0 2 4
Rice 17 0-1 1-7 0-0 1 0 2 3
Clark 3 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
DNP: Azinge, Mutombo, Bristol, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 5
TOTALS 200 9-36 11-33 15-16 45 14 12 66
Creighton 88, Georgetown 77 A spirited defensive comeback by the Georgetown Hoyas fell short in an 88-77 loss to Creighton before an announced crowd of 16,178 at CHI Health Center in Omaha.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
Georgetown's regular second half collapse came early in this game. From a 34-29 deficit with 5:10 to halftime, the Bluejays scored 14 straight to end the first half before a Aminu Mohammed tip-in closed the game to 48-31 at the break. Creighton was dominant from three yet again, with Alex O'Connell and Ryan Nembhard combining for seven threes in the first half against a GU offense that was 1 for 8 by halftime, shooting just 36 percent.Creighton started strong in the second half, hitting six of its first eight to go up 20, 67-47 at the 12:51 mark. The Hoyas then went to a smaller, pressing lineup with missed results, as backup forward Keyshawn Feazell took over the game, scoring six of his 12 second half points on three consecutive dunks over Aminu Mohammed, the nominative big man in Georgetown's set, and easily countering a Georgetown offense which went cold at the midway point, with three misses and a turnover. A Ryan Kalkbrenner dunk at the 8:15 mark gave the Bluejays a 77-61 lead but the Georgetown press was taking its toll mentally on Creighton's offensive sets. The Bluejays' next four possessions provided two misses and two turnovers, and it wasn't until the 6:01 mark that GU picked up a Mohammed basket to start the comeback. Following a pair of Mohammed free throws at the 4:59 mark, Georgetown forced consecutive turnovers that Dante Harris converted with a jumper and a three point play to close to nine, 79-70, at the 4:00 mark. The Hoyas forced picked up a change in possession from a Creighton shot clock violation 30 seconds later and Mohammed went inside for a basket and foul, 79-73. After a pair of Creighton free throws, Harris drove the lane again, 81-75, with 2:45 to play, a 14-4 run over six minutes. Eleven second half turnovers and poor shooting followed the Bluejays to the end. Creighton missed its next two shots to set up the Hoyas, but Kaiden Rice missed badly on consecutive three point attempts at the 2:04 and 1:15 mark, the latter after the Bluejays committed another shot clock violation. One of two free throws by Ryan Nembhard and a pair of from Ryan Kalkbrenner pushed the lead back to nine, 84-75, but the Jays were still on the ropes and the Hoyas had a chance. Following unusual back to back Georgetown timeouts in the huddle at the 1:03 mark, Harris lost the ball on the next possession and Tyler Beard was called for a quick foul, which led to a technical foul on Ewing's protest and an extra two at the line to go with one of two on the Beard call. The Bluejays were held without a basket for the final 8:10 but won the game at the line, thanks to 11 of 14 when it counted most. Three Georgetown players accounted for 62 of GU's 77 points: a career 27 from Mohammed, 23 from Harris, and 12 from Carey. The rest of the team shot a combined 4 for 18, including an 0 for 8 night for Kaiden Rice that proved decisive down the stretch, part of a team-wide 3 for 19 from outside the arc, and only six assists in the game.
Creighton finished the game with 12 threes, matching its total from Saturday, and shot 53 percent from the floor despite the late game troubles. Ryan O'Connell led all Bluejay scorers with 27, 19 in the first half. Georgetown picked up a season's best 28 points off 19 Creighton turnovers, a number worth watching as the Hoyas head to Marquette for a game Wednesday night. With a defensive effort at that game like that which was seen during the second half of this one, the Warriors will certainly be tested. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 37 8-18 1-6 4-5 4 2 2 23
Carey 31 4-7 1-5 1-1 3 2 3 12
Mohammed 34 8-15 0-0 11-11 10 0 5 27
Rice 29 0-2 0-6 2-2 1 0 0 2
Wilson 12 1-2 0-0 0-0 4 0 1 2
Reserves:
Beard 15 0-2 0-0 0-0 1 1 3 0
Billingsley 8 0-0 0-1 3-4 2 0 2 3
Ighoefe 17 2-3 0-0 1-1 7 1 3 5
Holloway 6 0-1 1-1 0-0 1 0 0 3
Clark 6 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
DNP: Azinge, Mutombo, Bristol, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 2 1
TOTALS 200 23-50 3-19 22-24 35 6 20 77
Creighton 80, Georgetown 66 Ryan Kalkbrenner and Ryan Hawkins combined for 52 points as Creighton powered past the struggling Georgetown Hoyas, at Capital One Arena, 80-66.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
The game got off to an inauspicious start for the 5,813 stalwarts who made their way to the 20,500 seat arena when Aminu Mohammed airballed his first shot 17 seconds into the game. On the Fox Sports 1 broadcast, Syracuse grad and freelance play by play announcer Tom Warme awkwardly told the audience that "Georgetown is in search of its first ACC win." Following a game where DePaul won on Wednesday with just seven active scholarship players on its roster, Creighton would do it with eight, after its starting forward Arthur Kaluma was ruled out of the game for an injury.
Creighton entered the game as won of the Big East's poorer shooting teams from outside, and missed its first five attempts in rapid order before freshman Ryan Nembhard sank the first of six threes for the Bluejays in the first half after combining for just four in its previous games against Butler. In a Georgetown season where up is down and down is up, it's become predictable that opponents put up career performances against the Hoyas' leaky perimeter. On Wednesday, it was Courvoisier McCauley. On Saturday, it was Ryan Hawkins. Hawkins was the outside presence for Creighton in a first half where it needed it. When the Bluejays were able to go to Hawkins or find center Ryan Kalkbrenner out positioning the Hoyas' trio of centers, Creighton delivered. When they could not, the Jays stalled at multiple moments of the first half. Outside of Hawking and Kalkbrenner, the Bluejays combined for only four field goals in the first half, giving Georgetown opportunities to regroup and play to its strengths. Driving inside, Georgetown began to build out a lead midway in the first half, taking a 24-21 lead at the 8:56 mark. Its defense, however, reopened the door to Hawkins, who sank back to back threes to regain the lead at the 6:56 mark and extended it to six, 32-26, at the 4:47 mark. A pair of three point baskets from Kaiden Rice rallied the Hoyas, but Creighton went back inside to finish the half, with three dunks in the last two minutes of the half by Kalkbrenner to carry a 42-37 lead at the break. Hawkins and Kalkbrenner combined for 32 at the break for a Creighton team that nearly matched its total output in the Butler game. The second half started much like the first: an early Creighton three follows by a volley of missed opportunities from both teams. Field goals from Donald Carey, Kaiden Rice and Dante Harris narrowed the gap to 50-46 with 14:29 to play in one of Georgetown's better two minute stretches of the game. But for regular followers of the Hoyas, this is the appointed time when the wheels fall off the bus, and they did once again. Twenty seconds into the following possession, little known reserve Keyshawn Feazell hit a three, 53-46, his first of the entire season. A missed jumper by Harris was traded for a three from Trey Alexander, 56-46. A minute later, the Hoyas picked up a shot clock violation, and Hawkins hung a three pointer six seconds later. Two dunks from Kalkbrenner followed. From down four, the Hoyas were now down 18, shooting 25 percent in the second half. While the Hoyas had a run in the remaining ten minutes, it was repelled from outside. A 9-0 run by the Hoyas closed to seven, 64-57, with 8:18 to play, but Hawkins answered with two threes in the Bluejays' next three possessions and the need never dipped under double digits thereafter. At the four media timeout, Creighton coach Greg McDermott calmly told his team, "Two baskets and two stops and we can put this game away," and they did just that. Two layups and two Georgetown turnovers put Creighton back up 13 with 1:17 left, and it ended at 14. Hawkins had eight threes for the Bluejays, a team entering the game shooting just 30.2 percent as team entering this game. No less impressive was Kalkbrenner, who dominated the Hoyas inside with 22 points and 15 rebounds, nine by dunks. By contrast, Mutombo, Ighoefe and Wilson combined for two field goals and no dunks. Georgetown's offense failed again to contend in the second half, shooting 30 percent after halftime and a woeful 2 for 15 from three point range. "Carey and Rice are Georgetown's best perimeter threats, and they combined to go 5 of 15 from deep," wrote Patrick Stevens in the Washington Post. "However, both took only one outside shot in the final 13 minutes." "You have a loss and you try to forget about it and move on to the next one. We're going to have to watch film with the mistakes that we made and make adjustments to get ready for practice and the game on Monday," said head coach Patrick Ewing. "As for the locker room, we still believe in each other every day in practice," said guard Donald Carey. "Every gameday, we still approach it as if the record is reversed." The record has not reversed, and entering a grueling three game, five day road trip, it's not likely to reverse anytime soon. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 31 5-13 0-3 0-0 4 5 2 10
Carey 35 3-6 3-8 1-1 7 2 1 16
Mohammed 25 4-12 0-0 3-4 4 2 1 11
Holloway 24 1-3 0-2 0-0 1 1 4 2
Mutombo 12 2-3 0-1 0-0 1 0 1 4
Reserves:
Beard 4 0-0 0-1 2-2 0 1 0 2
Billingsley 13 1-2 1-2 0-0 1 1 1 5
Ighoefe 11 0-0 0-0 0-0 3 1 2 0
Rice 31 4-4 2-7 2-3 5 0 1 16
Wilson 15 0-4 0-0 0-0 8 0 0 0
DNP: Azinge, Clark, Bristol, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 3
TOTALS 200 20-47 6-24 8-10 37 13 14 66
Gary Williams Discusses Georgetown, Maryland Now 76, Gary Williams has seen the Georgetown program up close as a player and coach at Maryland, and as a coach at American and Boston College. On a recent podcast, he commented on the ongoing struggles at the Hilltop and at College Park."They operate like it was 20 years ago," he said at the DC Coaches Podcast in this link from 247Sports.com. "Nobody ran a better program than Georgetown there. The way they dealt with the media, that they were ahead of the game in a lot of areas that teams, you know, you imitate what's successful and you try to catch that. Well, a lot of teams caught them and especially as big John's career was done as a coach, you know, all of a sudden that aura of the Georgetown basketball program was over, that period. Now, to pick that up and take it to the next level. I'm not saying that's easy, but that's what didn't happen at Georgetown. And I think they're paying the price now.""Without Big John there, you can't just say, 'Well good things will happen. You know, because we're Georgetown, Patrick Ewing was a great player.' Well, yeah, OK. But you know, these kids don't even remember seeing him. Right? And that's the problem...And I think there's a lot of Georgetown alums that haven't woken up yet about that, you know, that, hey, it's 2022 you know, things have changed." As to Maryland, "And the Catholic League in D.C. is, a lot of people feel that's the best league in the country in high school basketball. And so that's all there. Now, I think we have to capture that, you know, speaking, we as Maryland, we have to capture that. We have to make sure we've got everything in place to attract the best possible coach, in other words, from say, secretaries on up, to make sure that wow, that job looks great. I think I can get it done there." Randolph Childress: "Something Has To Change"Some candid comments from college basketball analysts Jeff Goodman, Randolph Childress and Kevin Sweeney following the DePaul loss. Check the first 15 minutes of the video below:DePaul 82, Georgetown 74
An inexplicable, unimaginable 26-0 run by the woeful DePaul Blue Demons carried the home team to an 82-74 win Wednesday, Georgetown's 12th consecutive loss and perhaps Patrick Ewing's most humbling defeat to date as head coach of the program.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
An alleged crowd of 2,767 at Wintrust Arena witnessed two bad teams facing off from the start. Georgetown missed seven of its first nine. And that was the good part: after an opening basket, DePaul missed seven straight and 12 of its next 13. A strong early effort from Donald Carey provided the only approximation of offense for yet another wobbly start for Ewing's offense, where Carey was 3 for 4 and the remainder of the team 1 for 9 as Georgetown build a respectable 19-7 lead midway in the first half over a DePaul offense which had flat lined, and represented GU's largest lead during the losing streak that will reach 57 days entering Saturday's game with Creighton.The DePaul turnaround began in the hands of reserve forward David Jones, who enjoyed a career evening over the indifferent defense of Aminu Mohammed and earned Jones a singular recognition in the annals of DePaul basketball: the school's first recorded triple double and the firt in any Big East game since 2016. Jones scored six of the Demons' next eight points and levied two assists in a 17-5 run to ties the score at 24 with 4:32 to halftime--without it, there was no way DePaul would have its made its second half spurt. Jones' play awoke what was remaining of a battered DePaul lineup, down to seven scholarship players following recurring injuries to its leading scorer, Javon Freeman-Liberty, and to forward Javan Johnson, to compete. Poor foul shooting (6 for 11) hurt the Demons down the stretch, and Georgetown was able to take a generous one point lead into halftime, 31-30, despite shooting 34 percent from the field and giving up seven first half turnovers leading to nine DePaul points at the break. The Achilles heel for the 2021-22 Hoyas has been second half lethargy and, much like watching a car crash over and over, you hope the script is flipped. This script hasn't changed all season. The opening moments of the half were shaky for both schools. Having called two quick timeouts in the first half, head coach Patrick Ewing burned the third of his four time outs one minute and 13 seconds into the second half, a strategy which doomed the Hoyas when time was most needed down the stretch. DePaul looked out of step early in the second half in this one. Up one at the 15:54 mark, the Blue Demons gave up seven points in 17 seconds thanks to a Kaiden Rice three, a offensive rebound and a layup off Rice's foul shot, and a steal and layup off the ensuing inbound. Suddenly Georgetown was up six, 43-37. Two minutes later, a Ryan Mutombo dunk pout GU up 47-42 at the 13:04 mark and the ghosts of Wintrust Arena, the same arena that had seen a Ewing team crumble here three years earlier, put a scare into the Hoyas that resulted in one of the greatest ten minutes in the last 20 years of forlorn basketball in Chicago. A basket by Oklahoma State transfer You Anei was matched with a three point play to tie the score at 47-47. An Aminu Mohammed basket and corresponding DePaul free throws knotted the score at 49-49 with 11 minutes to play, a 7-2 run. An awkward missed layup by Malcolm Wilson was returned by Jones for the basket, 51-49, and off went the Demons. A driving Dante Harris was swatted away by Anei, and suddenly the 10th best three point shooting team in the Big East exploded. Over its next four possessions, DePaul hit three consecutive three pointers to go up 11, 60-49. Ewing called his last time out at the 8:44 mark to stop the bleeding, but it simply bled out his team. Back to back misses by Tyler Beard led to a jumper by Anei, 62-49. Mutombo missed a short jumper and Brandon Johnson, shooting 29 percent from three this season, sank a long three, 65-49. Jalin Billingsley missed wildly, and Jones popped another three, 68-49. A media time out was Georgetown's only refuge before a layup and a alley-oop dunk brought the score to 75-49, and for those still counting, a 26-0 run in seven minutes and nine seconds. The Demons shot 10 for 11 in that stretch, the Hoyas 0 for 11, with four turnovers. A basket by Collin Holloway ended the shutout, 75-54. The final numbers were a 26-0 run and 33-2 overall. Following a Nick Ongenda dunk with 3:16 to play, 77-54, Georgetown stuffed the stat sheet with a aggressive 20-5 run to end the game with the outcome in no doubt, forcing DePaul turnovers on five consecutive possessions. Kaiden Rice scored 12 of his game high 24 points in this run, which could in not any way prevent DePaul's first back to back wins in Big East play in three seasons. So what happened? The staring lineup continues to sputter at key points of the game. Aminu Mohammed missed his first eight attempts of the game, did not take a shot for a crucial five minute stretch of the run, and picked up three layups in the final 2:17. Donald Carey, who had 12 points at halftime, whiffed on four attempts in the second. Dante Harris was 1 for 5 in the first, 1 for 6 after the break. Collin Holloway was benched for much of the second half, but Tyler Beard and Jalin Billingsley were a combined 1 for 5 in substitutions. Georgetown's veteran centers performed poorly. Tim Ighoefe was pulled after the first minute of the second half, finishing scoreless in 10 minutes. Malcolm Wilson missed two dunks in four minutes of the second half. Freshman Ryan Mutombo was 6 for 10 in the second half but he wasn't guarding the perimeter, where Harris, Carey, and Mohammed were simply embarrassed by a DePaul team that shot 73 percent after halftime, including seven threes: two from Jones, two from Brandon Johnson, and three from Courvoisier McCauley. Jones, Johnson, and McCauley entered the game shooting a combined 52 for 176 (.295) from three point range this season. In the second half, they combined to shoot 7 for 8. The late scoring run boosted Georgetown's final shooting to 41 percent for the game, with 12 threes, but were a wretched 34 percent inside the arc. It speaks volumes about the dysfunction of this team that even with 12 threes, they were still routed by the second worst team in the conference. Barring an even more unlikely repeat run in the Big East tournament, the 16th loss of the 2021-22 season clinches the third losing season in Patrick Ewing's five year tenure. The Hoyas have eight games remaining, five on the road, where they are a combined 0-8 this season. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 30 2-8 0-3 0-0 4 8 1 4
Carey 31 2-6 2-5 2-3 3 2 2 12
Mohammed 35 6-15 0-2 4-4 10 4 4 16
Holloway 13 1-3 1-1 0-0 2 1 2 5
Ighoefe 10 0-1 0-0 0-0 4 0 1 0
Reserves:
Beard 14 0-2 1-3 2-2 4 1 1 5
Billingsley 14 0-1 0-0 0-0 1 0 0 0
Azinge 1 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Rice 25 0-0 8-13 0-1 4 1 1 24
Mutombo 15 3-5 0-0 0-1 1 0 2 6
Clark 2 0-0 0-0 0-0 1 0 2 0
Wilson 9 1-3 0-0 0-0 2 0 3 2
DNP: Bristol, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 3
TOTALS 200 15-43 12-27 8-11 39 17 19 74
Ewing's Post Game CommentsPatrick Ewing's post-game coments following Georgetown's loss:"We just didn't give the effort when the effort was needed to pull out a tough win...We need everybody to do their part if we are going to get out of this funk."
Providence 71, Georgetown 52
Jared Bynum, a 2018 graduate of Georgetown Prep and backup guard for the Providence Friars, shredded the Hoyas for 27 second half points in a 71-52 TKO at Capital One Arena Sunday, extending the Hoyas' losing streak to 11 consecutive games before 5,575 in attendance.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
The shooting "felt like an ocean," Bynum said. "It felt like everything I was putting up was going down. That was pretty fun to see those shots fall. And being back at home with a lot of family and friends here, being able to play in front of them, I was really excited."Bynum's outburst was not in evidence to open the game, where turnovers and poor shooting dominated the stat sheets for both teams. From an early thee top open the game, PC missed its next six shots and was visibly contained inside, where GU has seen problems defending opponents in recent games. Early returns were favorable for the Hoyas in this one, where a 10-2 run midway in the first half, led by back to back baskets inside by Collin Holloway, gave the Hoyas a 19-14 lead at the 9:05 mark of the first half. Following a Providence time out, the Friars reset the offense, as Justin Minaya hit back to back three point field goals to give PC a 20-19 lead. The Hoyas stood tall, utilizing Ryan Mutombo inside and getting baskets from Aminu Mohammed and Collin Holloway down the stretch. Holloway's basket with 36 seconds to halftime gave Georgetown a 30-27 lead at the break, as Mohammed and Holloway combined for 18 of GU's 30 points with team-wide shooting of 45 percent at the break. As first halves go, it was promising for the Hoyas and frustrating for the top-ranked Friars, who gave up 10 turnovers by halftime. The teams traded blows at the foul line early in the second in a foul-plagued seven minutes to open the half. During a bizarre run where the Friars were called for three personal fouls in a three second span, a four point play from Donald Carey gave Georgetown a 36-34 lead, its first basket of the half. Little did anyone know how rare those baskets would come after the break. A free throw by Timothy Ighoefe closed to 43-41 at the 13:05 mark but as the Friars picked up its defense, the Hoyas went into retrograde. A Holloway turnover as converted into a layup and foul, 46-41. A Mutombo turnover picked up two at the line, 48-41. A Dante Harris turnover by Bynum led to a layup, 50-41. On its next series, GU turned the ball over on a shot clock violation, and Bynum went to work. Over the next three PC possessions he sank thee long threes over Dante Harris, while Georgetown missed two threes and a short jumper.
An Aminu Mohammed basket at the 7:34 mark was Georgetown's only field goal in a 25-5 run over eight minute, with additional threes by Bynum and Noah Horchler that gave PC a 22 point lead at the 4:25 mark, 68-46. From GU's 2 for 7 shooting mark to open the half, it had slumped to 4 for 19, and the Hoyas finished the half 5 for 25, surrendering 52 percent shooting to the Friars on 13 for 25 shooting with seven threes, six from Bynum. "Jared put on a cape and had as good a performance as I've seen since I've been the head coach here," said Providence coach Ed Cooley, whose #15-ranked Friars were visibly underproducing before Bynum took control. Bynum, who had just five points at halftime, outscored the entire Georgetown offense in the second half, 27-22, as GU shot 1 for 12 in the final 7:34 of the second half. Georgetown was led by 18 points by Aminu Mohammed amidst a season low from guards Dante Harris and Donald Carey, combining to go 1 for 14. Harris was especially vulnerable on defense, and was not able to contain Bynum after halftime. Collin Holloway and Ryan Mutombo, each playing well in the first half, finished 0 for 2 in the second half. Timothy Ighoefe, continuing to underperform in the pivot, failed to take a shot in 17 minutes of play, finishing with one point at the foul line. The two teams combined for 39 field goals and 39 turnovers for the game, with PC holding an 18-15 advantage on points off turnovers, with Bynum being the difference overall. If fans were expecting Ewing to take responsibility for the second half lapses on Bynum, he wasn't hearing any of it in post-game comments. "We're only going to win when everybody in that room decides that whatever we're doing right now is not working. They have to decide if they're going to listen to what we want them to do and get it done." The win was Providence's 12th of its last 15 against Georgetown after the Hoyas had won 11 of 13 from 2002 to 2013. But like many statistics, the 2012-13 season seems to be a watershed from the good old days to a decade of diminished expectations for the former flagship of Big East basketball, which is one loss away from clinching a fourth season at or below .500 in Patrick Ewing's five years as head coach. One of its better chances to end the losing streak arrives Wednesday at DePaul, where the longtime residents of the Big East cellar have dropped nine of its last 11. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 33 0-6 0-0 2-2 3 1 1 2
Carey 35 0-0 1-8 8-8 3 3 2 11
Mohammed 36 7-11 0-0 4-8 4 2 2 18
Holloway 31 3-5 1-4 0-0 4 2 3 9
Ighoefe 17 0-0 0-0 1-2 6 0 4 1
Reserves:
Beard 4 0-0 0-0 0-0 1 1 0 0
Billingsley 5 0-2 0-1 0-0 1 0 0 0
Rice 20 1-2 1-7 0-0 1 0 2 5
Mutombo 18 2-2 0-1 2-2 2 0 2 6
DNP: Azinge, Clark, Bristol, Wilson, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 5
TOTALS 200 13-28 3-21 17-22 30 9 16 52
Rich Chvotkin: #1500
Today is a special day in the United Kingdom, owing to the 70th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth's accession to the throne. Closer to home, Georgetown fans can celebrate a milestone all its own.Sunday's game with Providence is the 1,500th radio broadcast for Rich Chvotkin, who has been the undisputed voice of the Hoyas since 1974. Save for two months when Chvotkin was serving in the U.S. Army as a reservist during the Iraq War, he has called every game from the November 30, 1974 season opener versus Upsala (won by Georgetown, 80-58) to today's game."In the 1973-74 season, I went to some Georgetown games, and I saw they didn't have any radio," Chvotkin told The HOYA in 2005. "And I said, 'Well I used to do this in undergraduate school [at the University of Scranton], and maybe I'd try to get back into it.' So what I did was, I went to Fran Connors, who was then the Sports Information Director, and made a few tapes sitting up in the stands with a tape recorder. Then they gave it to [John] Thompson, and obviously he liked it." Some trivia among those 1,500 games:
Congratulations to Rich Chvotkin for yet another milestone, and for many more to come. St. John's 90, Georgetown 77
The lights are going out on the 2021-22 Georgetown Hoyas.Julian Champagnie scored 27 points as the St. John's Redmen routed the Hoyas, 90-77, before the smallest turnout for a Georgetown home game in 43 years. It was only the second win by a St. John's team in Washington since 2004, as Georgetown set a school record with its tenth consecutive loss.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
The Redmen entered the game having dropped four of five, with their post-season hopes in some jeopardy if they suffered a Quad 4 loss to the Hoyas. But no such worry--Georgetown began the game exhibiting the same mistakes that seem to follow the Hoyas like clockwork over the past six weeks. Despite the relative familiarity with the McDonough Gymasium environment, Georgetown missed 11 of its first 14 shot attempts, while on defense giving up a pair of second chance baskets to trail 18-9 seven minutes into the first half.After five minutes of unsteady play by Timothy Ighoefe, the 7-0 junior was benched for freshman Ryan Mutombo, who scored on back to back possessions to close the margin to 23-19 midway in the first half, only to see the Georgetown perimeter defense wilt on back to back threes by Champagnie to extend the lead to 31-22. Every time the Hoyas made a run, trouble followed. Back to back layups by Mutombo and Kaiden Rice closed to 31-27, only to see Dante Harris and Collin Holloway miss layups. A dunk and a Champagnie three followed, and St. John's was up eight. The Redmen led by as many as 10 before a late three by Donald Carey closed the gap to 45-38 at the break, as the Hoyas ended the half shooting 36 percent from the floor and just 33 percent (9 for 27) from two point range. Throughout this losing streak, the first five minutes out of the halftime locker room have been painful to watch, and the Hoyas did not disappoint tonight. With seven points as a reasonable deficit to overcome, with one or two threes that could rally the small but loyal student base, the Hoyas did a pratfall on both ends of the court, missing its first five attempts (two layups, three threes) while allowing the Redmen to score on each of its first four possessions, extendeing the lead to 17 in the first three minutes of the second half, 55-38. Georgetown did not make its first field goal of the half for nearly five minutes when Aminu Mohammed, in a season low effort, made his first and only basket of the game at the 15:25 mark. No one will confuse St. John's with Villanova, and the Redmen were anything but consistent in this game. But as poor as GU was playing, St. John's could do no less than run up the score, with a variety of dunks and layups that capped a 20-8 run and a 22 point lead at the 11:47 mark. Georgetown's numbers for the first eight minutes? Three field goals in ten attempts. Follwing a media time out, St. John's continued to extend the lead with three consecutive layups. The Redmen were even gifted when Kaiden Rice, the three point marksman, fouled St. John's Tareq Coburn while Coburn was shooting a three. St. John's led by as many as 26 into extended garbage time, but their defense was wanting, allowing Georgetown to mount a 19-6 run to close the score to 82-71 with 3:49 to play and provide a still faint pulse to the game. Missed threes dutifully followed, while the Redmen answered with a pair of layups to put yet another game out of reach. Champagnie, held to just 22 points over his last three games, led all scorers with 27, as St. John's shot 50 percent for the game, with 44 points in the paint and 15 points off GU turnovers. Donald Carey (23 points) led the Georgetown score sheet, one marred by a 1 for 13 finish for Mohammed and a team shooting just 37 percent against the 10th ranked defense in the Big East. "We've got to get back to the drawing board," said head coach Patrick Ewing after the game. "We've got to keep fighting." "We have another game against Providence on Sunday. They are a ranked team. We can't afford to be down on ourselves." Others already are. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 36 3-8 1-4 1-2 9 4 0 10
Carey 38 4-7 3-7 6-7 7 2 2 23
Mohammed 31 1-12 0-1 2-4 6 2 2 4
Holloway 29 3-6 0-1 1-2 4 2 2 7
Ighoefe 5 2-4 0-0 0-0 3 0 0 4
Reserves:
Beard 3 0-0 0-1 0-0 0 0 1 0
Billingsley 5 0-1 0-0 0-0 1 1 2 0
Rice 26 1-1 5-10 3-3 2 0 4 20
Mutombo 23 4-8 0-0 1-2 7 0 3 9
Clark 2 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Wilson 1 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
DNP: Azinge, Bristol, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 1
TOTALS 200 18-48 9-24 14-20 40 11 16 77
Longest Losing Streaks
Why Weren't More People At The Game?
A shocking lack of turnout at Thursday's game can be traced to a University decision to limit capacity, but that fans weren't notified in advance.
No Place Like Home
Georgetown's recent attendance at Capital One Arena has renewed interest in the future use of McDonough Gymnasium for men's basketball.The Hoyas played at McDonough from 1951 through 1981 when fan demand moved games to Capital Centre, and then to what is now Capital One Arena in 1997. Attendance at McDonough peaked at 4,200 seats and is now listed at just 2,200, making it infeasible to host most games.In 2020, the Georgetown Basketball History Project discussed the various efforts proposed to address the gym, including a proposal to realign it along the design of Allen Arena, a 5,028 seat arena in Nashville. Last week, Bobby Vogel at Thompson's Towel proposed a series of options to reconfigure the seating without major reconstruction of the building as a whole. "What I have done is created a virtual model of McDonough with orientations of the court and potential bleachers to accommodate a larger capacity than the current model," he wrote. "In addition, I created a model of the court in its current orientation. By comparing the surface areas of the bleachers in these models with that of McDonough in its current form, I have approximated the capacity of each of these new orientations. What I found is promising, and gives reason to believe that new bleachers in a more efficient orientation may be enough on their own to make McDonough Arena a long-lasting home venue for men's basketball games." There are currently no University plans as to the future of the facility. Seton Hall 70, Georgetown 63
Seton Hall forward Tray Jackson tied a career high with 21 points as the Pirates withstood the Georgetown Hoyas, 70-63, before 3,462 at Capital One Arena.
POST-GAME COVERAGE
"If you look at all our games, we are right there, we are right in them," said Georgetown head coach Patrick Ewing. "But then the mistakes that we make, those rebounds definitely hurt."
The Pirates, who had dropped four of its last five, entered the game without leading scorer Bryce Aiken, missing his fourth consecutive game due to a concussion. As such, the Hall played tentative to open the game and appeared to give the homestanding Hoyas the early edge. Aminu Mohammed scored Georgetown's first five points and seven of its first 12 as the Hoyas carried a five point lead seven minutes into the game. It was the only points Mohammed would score before halftime, and he took only one shot thereafter. The Hall had no options inside despite a shaky first half from Timothy Ighoefe, one magnified when freshman Ryan Mutombo saw action and further limited the Pirates inside. Instead, Seton Hall went to the three point arc, despite being last in the conference in three pointers made per game (6.0). Instead, they made six in the first half alone, getting two from Jackson and two from Jared Rhoden, during a run where Georgetown shot 1 for 11 in return. The Pirates led by as many as ten before a Kaiden Rice three at the buzzer narrowed the score to 35-28 at halftime. A dunk by Jackson was the only points either team could score for nearly four minutes to open the second half, a remarkable exhibition of unremarkable basketball, as the teams combined to go 1 for 12, many from close range. Trailing by 11, 39-28, back to back threes from Donald Carey and Kaiden Rice rallied the Hoyas and led to a 19-5 run midway in the second half. With the Pirates ice cold rom the field, baskets by Aminu Mohammed, Dante Harris and Donald Carey regained the lead and a Harris jumper gave GU its largest lead since the first half, 49-44, at the nine minute mark. The teams traded baskets for the next two minutes, but Georgetown still held a 53-49 lead at the 7:10 mark when Jackson hit back to back threes to give Seton Hall a lead they would not relinquish. Back to back turnovers stalled the Georgetown attack, and after Seton Hall answered with a Myles Cale three to go up 58-53, Kaiden Rice answered with a long three to close to 58-56 with 4:18 to play. It was Rice's last points of the game, as the mercurial forward missed his final five shots of the game. Up two but needing another big play, Jackson stepped up from behind the arc, with a three to give the Hall a five point lead at the 3:52 mark, 61-56. With an exchange of baskets and a three point play by Carey to close to 63-59, both teams struggled down the stretch, missing six of its next seven shots combined. A basket by Jalin Billingsley brought the Hoyas to three with 1:34 remaining, but Billingsley was caught out of position on the next play and Rhoden sliced through the GU defense for a layup at the one minute mark, 66-61. Following a miss inside from Harris and an errant three from Rice, Jackson added two at the line, 68-61. A missed three from Mohammed was Georgetown's last hope, and the Pirates put the game away on the foul line. Seton Hall's 12 threes were its most against any Division I opponent since its opener with Fairleigh Dickinson and its 39 percent shooting, however ragged, was its best in nearly two weeks. Jackson led scorers with 21 points and seven rebounds, followed by 14 from Rhoden and 12 from sophomore Kadary Richmond, despite shooting just 1 for 7 after halftime. "What Tray gives us is a pick-and-pop four man who can really shoot the basketball," said Seton Hall coach Kevin Willard on the Fox Sports 1 post-game interview. "It was trying to get him a lineup that we could get him shots. All week we practiced on just trying to get him open and get him opportunities to spread the defense and I thought it really worked well." No less valuable: free throw shooting. The Pirates, who had lost its last two games to the Hoyas at the foul line, held GU to just five attempts this evening compared to Seton Hall's 14 for 19 at the line.
Donald Carey scored 15 for the Hoyas, 12 after halftime, and was followed by 14 from Mohammed and 12 each from Rice and Harris. Mutombo finished with six points and six rebounds in 21 minutes. Late game execution doomed the Hoyas, shooting 1 for its last 8 for the game despite trailing by just two entering the final four minutes of a winnable game. "We've done things to come back and take the lead, and then, with about five or six minutes to go, it falls apart," Ewing said in post-game comments with the Washington Post. "We have to be able to continue to build on those good things that we do to finish out the game." Georgetown's ninth consecutive loss ties a school record held in the 1971-72 and 2003-04 seasons. The Georgetown half of the box score:
MIN 2FG 3FG FT REB A PF PTS
Starters:
Harris 37 6-13 0-4 0-0 6 5 3 12
Carey 29 4-5 2-4 1-1 3 1 3 15
Mohammed 37 4-12 1-2 3-4 8 1 4 14
Holloway 19 0-2 0-2 0-0 0 2 1 0
Ighoefe 12 1-4 0-0 0-0 6 0 1 2
Reserves:
Beard 6 0-1 0-0 0-0 1 1 1 0
Billingsley 12 1-2 0-1 0-0 2 0 2 2
Rice 26 0-1 4-11 0-0 1 0 3 12
Mutombo 21 3-4 0-1 0-0 6 0 2 6
DNP: Azinge, Clark, Bristol, Wilson, Muresan
Injured: Riley
Team Rebounds 3
TOTALS 200 19-44 7-25 4-5 36 10 20 63
Attendance: Mostly Blue
An announced crowd of just 3,462 at Capital One Arena marks another low in home attendance this season.The figure represents the lowest attended game off-campus versus any Big East opponent and the sixth lowest all- time. Thursday's game versus St. John's has been moved to McDonough Gymnasium, with the Hoyas returning Sunday afternoon versus Providence.Through 12 games, the Hoyas are averaging 5,858 per game. Here are the 10 smallest off-campus home crowds since 1981 (current season games highlighted):
|
