Chris Wright scored 21 points, Julian Vaughn scored a career-high 19 points, Greg Monroe recorded 12 and dished out a career-high 12 assists and No. 7 Georgetown defeated Providence 79-70. Get NCAA Basketball tickets and see Wright lead his team to victory. Wright registered 16 points in the second half, which helped the Hoyas (18-5, 8-5 Big East) erase an eight-point deficit.
After the game, Georgetown coach John Thompson III admitted, “Road wins in this league are difficult to come by.” The coach continued to say that things were not going well for the Hoyas and he was extremely frustrated “for large parts of the game.” Thompson praised the Friars for their offensive execution and their defensive tenacity.
According to the RPI, the Hoyas have the most rigorous schedule in the nation. Georgetown came off a 103-90 victory over then-No. 2 Villanova on Feb. 6. But the Friars aren’t going to shed tears for Georgetown since they are in the middle of a 6-of-8 stretch of games against ranked teams. Their next four opponents are No. 4 Villanova, No. 5 West Virginia, No. 2 Syracuse and No. 19 Connecticut. Providence coach Keno Davis stated he has never heard of a team playing four seeded teams in a row.
Jamine Peterson scored 23 points and Bilal Dixon added a career-high 16 rebounds for Providence. Although the Friars outrebounded the Hoyas 42-31, Providence shot just 34 percent from the field and 64 percent from the charity stripe.
This was a physical contest. Dixon and Monroe got tangled up under the basket with 16:43 left in the game. Both players were talking trash before referees sent them back to their benches to cool off.
Providence went up 47-40 with 15 minutes left in regulation before Georgetown got in a scoring rhythm and made 14 of the next 15 points. During that scoring burst, Wright swished a three-pointer to tie the game.
In the second half, Providence led by as many as eight points. Then the Hoyas rallied back, tying the game with Wright’s fast-break layup with 12 minutes remaining. Georgetown took a 49-48 lead after Wright knocked down a foul shot to convert the three-point play.
Peterson failed to make two free throws (the Friars missed 12 foul shots in the game). After that, Wright made a free throw. Peterson had a chance to hit a 3-pointer, but he missed and Wright made two more free throws, which gave the Hoyas a 54-48 advantage with 9:40 left. Providence’s Sharaud Curry buried a three-pointer and the Friars later cut the deficit to 56-54, but they never got closer.
The Friars had the opportunity to make a comeback with 2:00 minutes remaining when Marshon Brooks made a layup. The score was 69-64. Then the Hoyas’ full-court pressure made a Friars’ defender miss the ball. Monroe caught the ball and drove for the layup and foul. He converted a 3-point play, which gave Georgetown a 71-64 lead with 70 seconds left of the game.
Davis told the press, “I thought our team gave as good as an effort as we possibly could, and for them to come away with a win shows why they are the seventh team in the country.”
By Brent Warnken
This article was sponsored by StubHub. StubHub sells NCAA Basketball tickets, as well as many other kinds of sports tickets, concert tickets, special events tickets and theater tickets.
Distributed by ContentCrooner.com