Villanova Basketball: Eric Paschall starts new season off on hot note

Thanks to a strong outing by Eric Paschall, the Villanova Wildcats started off the 2018-19 season on a hot note with a win over Morgan State.

Once again, expectations are high for the Villanova basketball team, as Jay Wright‘s team is excited about making a run for their third title in four seasons after defeating the Michigan Wolverines in the National Championship last April.

Even though key players like Donte DiVincenzo and Mikal Bridges, the Wildcats are still considered one of the early favorites to win it all, although when seeing how teams like Duke and Kansas looked on Tuesday, that’s always easier said than done.

Starting the year off ranked No. 9, the Wildcats know they will face heavy pressure throughout the season since the team technically will be playing with targets on their backs as defending champions. But thanks to players like Eric Paschall, it will hopefully be easier for Villanova to live up to the hype.

During Tuesday’s opener, it was Paschall that led the way for the Wildcats during their 100-77 win over the Morgan State Bears by scoring 26 points on 7-of-11 shooting from the field. Along with Paschall’s strong game, Villanova also saw contributions from other key players like Phil Booth (17 points) Saddiq Bey, who registered 16 point and four rebounds off the bench.

Seeing Paschall transfer from Fordham a couple of years ago has worked wonders for the Wildcats when seeing how he’s slowly been getting better each season. Just look at how Paschall kicked off the new season with 26 points after averaging just 10.6 points per game last year, and it’s easy to make the assumption that 2018-19 will most likely result in his best impact yet.

While one game doesn’t define an entire season, keep in mind the only time Paschall broke the 20-point mark during last year’s championship run happened to come in the Final Four against the Kansas Jayhawks when he finished with 24 points.

What was even more impressive about that performance by Paschall when facing the Jayhawks is he managed to do so on 10-of-11 shooting from the field, which is insane.

Morgan State is nowhere close to the level of Kansas or some of the other teams that will be standing in Villanova’s way to making another run at a title. However, it was great to see Paschall kick off the new season the way he did since the forward is going to be a key factor in the success of the Wildcats from now until the spring.