Villanova Basketball: Suffering third upset of year shows concerns for Wildcats

For the third time this year, the Villanova basketball team was on the wrong side of an upset, this time against the Pennsylvania Quakers.

After winning their second title in three seasons last spring, Jay Wright knew the Villanova basketball team was going to face a difficult path during the 2018-19 season when it came to trying to make it three in four years.

Not only were the Wildcats facing the new pressure of potentially becoming the next dynasty in college basketball, but also adjusting to the losses of key players like Mikal Bridges and Jalen Brunson after the former Villanova stars entered the NBA Draft.

Rightfully so, the Wildcats started off the new season ranked as one of the top teams in the country since despite seeming like a long shot, the talent certainly seemed to be there to at least make things interesting.

With that being said, after already suffering two tough losses earlier in the season to Michigan and Furman, Villanova entered Tuesday’s game against Pennsylvania ranked No. 17 in the country.

When looking at all of the history surrounding the Big Five along with the fact that the Quakers started off the season on a hot note by winning eight of their first 10 games, the Wildcats knew Tuesday’s battle was going to be quite the difficult battle.

From the start, Villanova looked like a team that wasn’t prepared at all for this contest, and while they certainly deserve credit for battling their way back in, losing to the Quakers by three points sums up what kind of game this was for Wright’s squad.

Not even a strong outing by Collin Gillespie (21 points) was good enough to help Villanova escape with the win in this one. And with three losses to their name heading into Saturday’s big showdown with the Kansas Jayhawks, the Wildcats are in terrible shape at this point in the middle of December.

Even if this year’s team is nowhere near the level of talent from last year’s championship squad, the fact that it took Villanova until the end of December last year just to suffer their first loss shows how much of a difference one year can make.

It’s frustrating to see the Wildcats suffer three upsets this early on in the season, but that frustration could hit a whole new level come Saturday since this team seems like they’re going to be overmatched when taking on the Jayhawks.

Until Wright figures out a way to get his team to turn things around, the concerns are only going to continue to grow for Villanova. Come March, the Wildcats may not even be viewed as the kind of team that seems capable of making a deep run come tournament time, that is assuming they work their way into the big dance.