Villanova’s defense comes to the front in a 68-60 victory over Connecticut

It turns out that Jay Wright was really serious about working on his team’s underachieving defense during Villanova’s week of practices preparing for Saturday’s game against Connecticut.

The work showed. The 10th-ranked Wildcats established new team bests for lowest defensive three-point and overall shooting percentages and got their own offense cranked up just enough down the stretch to take a 68-60 victory over the Huskies at Finneran Pavilion.

The Cats (14-3, 9-2) limited UConn (10-6, 7-6) to 36.4% shooting overall and 25.9% from three-point range. The Huskies shot just 29.6% in the second half and went a stretch of 7 minutes, 5 seconds with no field goals in seven attempts and three points.

After the game, Wright admitted that defense was his team’s sole focus during the week at practice.

“All our practices were all defense,” the Wildcats coach said. “We really didn’t do anything offensively. I didn’t know how it was going to affect us, I was hoping it wouldn’t but it did. I think the guys just stuck with it and trusted the defense and kept a great attitude, and that’s important.”

Going into the game, the Cats ranked 290th in NCAA Division I in field-goal defense (46.4%) and 318th in three-point defense (37.8%).

“A lot of the reason that we’re not good defensively is what we chose as a staff how to allocate our time in practice,” Wright said. “It really wasn’t the guys’ fault. We were trying to get ourselves organized on offense and we just got away from defense. They really stepped up today.”

The focus of Villanova’s defense Saturday was 6-foot-5 sophomore guard James Bouknight, a preseason All-Big East selection who was playing in only his second game since recovering from left elbow surgery, and the unit passed the test.

While Bouknight finished with 21 points, 14 of them came in the game’s first 11 minutes, 4 seconds. After hitting a driving layup with 8:56 left in the first half, he didn’t make another basket until he knocked down a three-pointer with 34.7 seconds remaining in the game.

» READ MORE: Villanova and Jay Wright look ahead to how COVID-19 will challenge the Big East and NCAA tournaments

After hitting 6 of his first 7 shots, Bouknight connected on just one of his last 10. It was a group effort by the Wildcats’ defense, but 6-6 junior Brandon Slater stood out for his play.

“Slater was great,” Wright said. “He’s a real good defensive player and he did a great job on him. Even in the first half, I thought some of the shots (Bouknight) hit were pretty good defensive possessions. He just hits tough shots and that’s what makes him a great player.

“I think we did a really good job in the second half, especially with Slater getting up in him and contesting his threes.”

Slater, who had four points and two steals in 22 minutes, tried to deflect the attention.

“It’s a team defense,” he said. “We’re a team once we get on defense with all five guys. I just can’t take that credit myself. It’s all our guys coming in and stepping up for each other and playing for each other.”

The Wildcats had to grind this one out. Their five three-point baskets and 22.7% shooting from the arc were season lows. Leading 47-45, they managed to shut down the Huskies in a 10-2 run that boosted their advantage to 57-47 on Justin Moore’s layup with 4:25 to play.

Then after missing their first nine three-point attempts in the second half, Collin Gillespie drained a pair of treys in three possessions for a 63-55 lead with 1:31 remaining. Though UConn cut the deficit to six twice after that, it couldn’t get any closer.

Gillespie led the Wildcats with 20 points and Jeremiah Robinson-Earl added 17 points and 11 rebounds for his third double-double of the season.

“I think it was a big step for us defensively,” Robinson-Earl said. “A week of just having practices and not games and just going back to the details and the little things that make us a great defensive Villanova basketball team has been very helpful this week.”