There is a wealth of data and bracketology metrics out there along with bubble watches and enough analysis to drown you in all the NETs and SORs you want. Cut through all of it and for most Big East teams in most seasons it comes down to two simple questions: Did you win 20 games overall in the regular season before your conference tournament? Did you finish .500 or better in your conference? Mileage varies with assorted good wins/bad losses along the way which create extremes in both directions, but usually if the answer is Yes to both of those you’re in good shape. The Seton Hall Pirates put themselves behind the 8-ball a little bit by only going 7-4 out of conference, so by that two-prong test the Pirates would need to go 13-7 in the Big East to hit those marks which only two other Seton Hall teams have done in the history of the Big East. In wake of an offseason that was panned by a sizable chunk of media and fans, and an out of conference record that was less than stellar and hit rock bottom after the loss at home to a Rutgers team that ended up being not as good as expected, this seemed highly unlikely. All of it was just “noise outside the locker room” for Shaheen Holloway, Kadary Richmond, Dre Davis, and the rest of this Seton Hall Pirates squad which saw the “unlikely” and went from losing to Rutgers to beating UConn within 11 days and kept running from there and finished their regular season on Saturday evening in front of about 9,500 folks at the Prudential Center in Newark with a low-ish stress victory over the lowly DePaul Blue Demons 86-62 to check off those boxes heading into the Big East Tournament at the mecca of college basketball next week.
Senior night ceremonies prior to the start of a game can sometimes produce a bit of an emotional hangover to start the game. These Pirates only needed a few minutes to shake them off, with DePaul taking advantage 7-5 to take a brief early lead…which lasted 34 seconds.
Dre Davis hit a three followed shortly after by a pair of free throws from Al-Amir Dawes to give the Pirates back the lead at 12-10 with 13 minutes left in the first half. Both teams then fell into a defensive stretch where they struggled to score for a bit before the Pirates broke through in the last three minutes before the half. Dawes sent an alley-oop to Isaiah Coleman and then a beautiful “not fully looking at him” pass to Dre Davis to drill a 3 with 1:15 left in the first half. Jaden Bediako hit a layup just before the buzzer to give the Pirates a 35-26 lead at halftime.
The second half was Dre Davis and Dylan Addae-Wusu’s time to shine. Davis started things off by kicking in 7 quick points as DePaul did not hit a field goal for the first four minutes of the half to bring the Pirates into the first media break with a 46-31 lead. Another Davis three pointer pushed the Pirates lead over 20 for the first time with just under 13 minutes left at 55-33. Elijah Hutchins-Everett had a dunk and a three pointer before Addae-Wusu cleaned the glass with a clutch offensive rebound off a miss that appeared to break whatever was left of DePaul’s spirit. Addae-Wusu hit a three pointer with 3:20 left to put the Pirates up 80-53 and notch his 1,000th career point before Coach Holloway pulled the starters for a curtain call. Davis led the way with 28 points and 7 rebounds as Addae-Wusu finished with 19 points for his second highest total of the season in the 86-62 victory.
After the game the Pirates were showing a little something not familiar around these parts the past few seasons: Relief. Coach Shaheen Holloway needed to catch up on sleep and watch his young son play a basketball game. Too bad we lost an hour for daylight savings time…
News and notes:
- At the postgame press conference, the Dean of Seton Hall Basketball writers, Jerry Carino of the Asbury Park Press awarded the 2nd annual JP Pelzman Award to Dre Davis for media relations. The late Pelzman was a mentor to many of the folks in the media room who follow the Pirates, myself included. Pelzman was a distinguished writer for years with Long Island Newsday, Bergen Record, Forbes, and Piratecrew.com at Rivals until his passing in Summer of 2022.
- Dre Davis set a new career high with his family watching as his 28 point output passed his 25 point showing against Georgetown on February 7.
- Dylan Addae-Wusu’s 19 points was just behind the 20 he scored against Missouri in December.
- Next up for the Pirates is the 4-5 matchup against St. John’s in the Big East Tournament at Madison Square Garden in New York City Thursday afternoon March 14 at about 2:30pm. It will be the second of four games at The Garden on Thursday following UConn playing the winner of the Wednesday Butler (8) vs Xavier (9) first round matchup.
- On Sunday morning the Big East announced the All-Big East teams for the 2023-24 season. The first team was Kadary Richmond, Tristen Newton and Cam Spencer of UConn, Baylor Scheierman of Creighton, Devin Carter of Providence, and the lone holdover from last year, Tyler Kolek of Marquette. Isaiah Coleman was named to the All-Freshman team.
JD Walker is one of the co-founders of Stream Punk Entertainment and has covered the Philadelphia Union, Big East Basketball, and New Jersey high school basketball since 2022. He has a wide-spanning career with experience in a variety of roles inside and outside the world of sports including basketball operations, gameday entertainment, promotions, broadcasting, and finance. He’s a Jersey Shore native sprung from a cage on Highway 9, and loves to geek out on the business and legal side of the games we all love.