Seton Hall basketball handles Butler as guards star, moving closer to NCAA Tournament bid
NEWARK – The buzzer sounded on another huge win for Seton Hall basketball, which took a giant step closer to an NCAA Tournament berth, and Jaden Bediako strode through the paint one last time.
The Pirates’ center wasn’t going to the hoop, however.
He was going to the student section.
Bediako celebrated Saturday’s 76-64 handling of fellow bubble squad Butler by exchanging hugs and high-fives with schoolmates who came out in droves for the first time in over a month. He was quickly followed by the rest of his teammates.
“They’re part of the win, also,” postgrad guard Al-Amir Dawes said. “They give us a lot of energy. When they’re there, we feed off that. Shout-out to the student section.”
The presence of at least 1,000 of them – this from a school with an undergraduate enrollment of 6,000 – meant a lot to the players, who took to the campus’ main dining hall Thursday to promote this crucial game.
“That was a good experience, just being able to embrace them as they embrace us,” senior wing Dre Davis said. “Obviously they came out tonight and really showed a lot of support and a lot of love. That means a lot and it goes a long way.”
It wasn’t just the students. The sold-out crowd of 10,500 largely arrived on time and burst into two standing ovations in the opening minutes as the Hall jumped out to a 16-3 lead thanks to stifling ball pressure.
“It was good to see the turnout, especially because the last couple of crowds, they were there, but they weren’t there how they were tonight,” senior guard Kadary Richmond said. “So we appreciate them taking their time out of their Saturday to watch us get a big win.”
Seton Hall doesn’t have the built-in advantage of an on-campus, basketball-specific arena. The Prudential Center is a spiffy pro hockey venue that transitions pretty well for hoops – better than the Meadowlands Arena ever did – but its atmosphere is largely what its denizens make of it.
“For them to be out here and understand the importance of this game and the next couple games, it’s super important,” Hall coach Shaheen Holloway said. “But not just for the students, I want to say all the regular fans have been coming out all year, and I want to thank those guys for coming out as well.”
They’ve bore witness to one of the more impressive surprises in college basketball. Picked to finish ninth in the Big East’s preseason coaches’ poll and left for dead after a rocky non-conference showing, Seton Hall (18-9 overall, 11-5 Big East) now needs just two wins in its final four games to lock up a Big Dance spot. That includes a Senior Night home game against winless DePaul (a 1-3 finish would leave them on the bubble heading into the Big East Tournament, where they are likely to play in the 4-5 game).
The Pirates are now 8-7 vs. Quads 1-2 – an important metric for the selection committee. A record of .500 or better in those contests is viewed favorably. As bracketologist Brad Wachtel pointed out, only one high-major team ever has been left out of the field with a winning record against Quads 1-2.
They have beaten Butler (16-12, 7-10) six straight times, sweeping the series each of the past three seasons.
Of note: Holloway now has the most wins by a Seton Hall coach in his first two seasons with 35, passing Kevin Willard.
FIVE TAKEAWAYS
1. Big East's best backcourt?
Holloway’s preseason proclamation that Seton Hall possesses the Big East’s best backcourt is looking better and better. Richmond (20 points, 6 rebounds), Dawes (19 points, 5 rebounds, 3 steals) and Davis (21 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists) are playing together like a finely tuned orchestra.
"There’s a trust factor that goes into that," Davis said. "We’ve been playing together for two years now and there’s a lot of trust in each other."
That trust comes in handy down the stretch of close games. Whenever Butler drew close, one of the big three responded, and they took turns.
"Knowing what everybody’s capable of, and knowing where everyone is going to be and who’s good at what in certain moments of the game, I think that’s helping us down the stretch," Richmond said.
Interesting stat: The Pirates are 16-4 this season when Dawes scores in double figures.
"They don’t get enough credit," Holloway said of his trio. "I don’t think Dre gets a lot of credit, but we’re not worried about that. Things speak for themselves."
2. Bediako's big effort
The big man's nine points, nine boards and four blocked shots only tell part of the story. His plus/minus of plus-17 was the Hall's best as he basically locked Butler out of the paint for 32 authoritative minutes.
The Bulldogs scored just 16 points in the paint, a minuscule number, and got outscored 44-16 in that category.
"We’ve been seeing this all season," Davis said Bediako's performance. "It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone."
The Santa Clara graduate transfer has just one season with the program, but he's carving out a place in the Pirate pantheon.
"He’s somebody that, I told you guys in the beginning of the year, ‘Don’t worry about him, he’s gonna be fine,’" Holloway said. "And he’s kind of being fine.”
3. Dominant defense early
The Pirates started the game on fire defensively, turning Butler over four times in the first four minutes – and taking all four miscues the other way for buckets. By the game’s second timeout they had racked up 13 points off turnovers and led 16-3.
That set the tone. Butler made some runs in response but never took the lead.
"We just had to set the first punch," Dawes said. "Start with our defense and we knew our offense was going to come."
Holloway tipped his hat to senior guard Dylan Addae-Wusu, who was particularly disruptive and forceful in attacking loose balls.
"I got on Dylan because Dylan normally gives us a lot of little plays that don’t show up on the stat sheet," the coach said. "I thought from the 8-minute mark down (in the second half), I thought he got a lot of loose balls, 50-50 balls for us, that I was on him about getting."
4. Fuquan Edwin honored
Even before he walked onto the court at halftime, the rumble from the crowd washed over the arena.
“Fuuuuuu.”
Fuquan Edwin was introduced to a standing ovation after his induction into the athletic department’s Hall of Fame earlier Saturday.
A 6-foot-6 wing out of Paterson Catholic High School, Edwin initially committed to the Hall under Bobby Gonzalez, and stuck with the school after Gonzalez was fired and Kevin Willard was hired in March 2010. He flourished as a sophomore, averaging 12.5 points, 6.2 rebounds and an NCAA-leading 3.0 steals as Seton Hall went 21-13.
He put up similar numbers the next two seasons and became one of just two Pirates to tally more than 1,600 career points and 200 career steals (All-American Dan Callandrillo is the other). He still holds program records for steals in a career (295) and a season (102) and was Big East Defensive Player of the Year as a senior.
Edwin was among a whopping 40 former Seton Hall players in attendance Saturday, including 2016 Big East Tournament MVP Isaiah Whitehead, 1989 Final Four team sub Michael Cooper and 2004 NCAA Tournament team starter Andre Sweet, who made a rare appearance.
“It’s huge," Holloway, who of course is a former Pirate star, said of the alums showing up. "I thought it was good for Fuquan Edwin to get honored today in the Hall of Fame, he deserved it, he had a great career. And for everybody else coming out here supporting us and showing love, it’s always good. I told you guys before, at Seton Hall, when I’m here, they’re here. So we’re all together. It’s big. You see my boy Isaiah (Whitehead) was here, he was here all week with us (on campus), so it was good."
5. Toughest week ahead
It doesn’t get any harder than what’s ahead for the Pirates the coming week: trips to 15th-ranked Creighton Wednesday (9 p.m., Fox Sports 1) and No. 1 UConn Sunday (noon, CBS).
Winning either of those would essentially punch an NCAA Tournament ticket. The Pirates lost to Creighton in triple overtime and beat UConn by 15 in Newark this season. But those squads are a combined 27-2 at home.
It's a lot to ask, but after Saturday's impressive showing, picking off one of those games is a luxury, not a necessity.
Jerry Carino has covered the New Jersey sports scene since 1996 and the college basketball beat since 2003. He is an Associated Press Top 25 voter. Contact him at jcarino@gannettnj.com.
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Seton Hall basketball tops Butler as guards star, closing in on NCAAs
