Xavier cruises past Saint Francis by a final of 96-74

What should a buy game look like? We’ve belabored the point to the extent that we’re beating a dead horse, but a dead horse offers no defense and I like winning: Xavier has made a remarkable turnaround in a remarkably small amount of time. The Muskies won their first two games by a total of 9 points; they led by at least that much for the final 21 minutes of today’s game.

After Xavier sleepwalked through the first war of the game, it only briefly looked like they were going to take a similarly somnambulatory approach to the remainder of the contest. After All Wright (15/2/3) hit a couple of FT out of the media timeout, Tre Carroll (21/6/4) knocked in a bucket and-one and then a three to push the lead to multiple possessions, a cushion the home team would enjoy for the final 34 minutes of game.

Xavier continued to ease away, with Roddie Anderson III (28/5/5 off the bench, 5-9 from deep) making the lead 21-12 with just over half an hour to play. It was from there that Saint Francis made its last real overtures at getting into the game, going on a 9-3 run that cut it to 24-20 and prompted Richard Pitino to call a timeout and offer some fairly unvarnished feedback to his team regarding their efforts on the defensive end. It was once again Tre Carroll coming to the rescue, drilling a three and then assisting Roddie Anderson III for a layup to push the lead back into a safer range. Carroll was Xavier’s man in the first half, leading all scorers with 15 and chipping in 5 boards before the break.

Without showing a whole lot of real spark for most of the first of the first half, Xavier cruised on the back of a Roddie Anderson III jumper to take the game into the half leading 44-33. In a game KenPom had favored them to win by 22, they were up 11 at the halfway mark. Progress!

And then, out of the locker room… nothing changed. Filip Borovicanin (6/8/1) opened the half with a bucket, followed by All Wright and – for the first and last time on the day – Jovan Milicevic (3/5/2). After allowing Saint Francis to score on their first two possessions of the half, Xavier clipped off six straight points to send the game into the first media timeout at 17 and effectively over as a contest.

Xavier’s bench coalition got good minutes this game, especially late on, and showed signs of being more engaged as potential contributors going forward. Isaiah Walker dropped 10 on 4-7/2-4/0-0 shooting in 19 minutes and was active on the defensive end. Anthony Robinson went for 5 and 5; sure he still committed 3 fouls in 14 minutes, but the flashes of not being a complete spectator on the offensive end are encouraging. Mier Panoam didn’t light up the scoreboard, but his spectacular chase down block in the second half brought Cintas to its feet.

Heading into the Shootout, this one showed a lot of progress from the alarming trends of the early season. Xavier had pulled out a big lead against Marist before giving it all away and scrapping to the finish line of an ugly win; today they led by 11 at the half and won by 22, and that with spending much of the last 10 minutes defending like they were conserving energy for the second half of a double header. They could never pull away from Le Moyne, letting them keep it within two possessions for most of the first half and single digits for basically the whole game; today they pushed out to an early lead and slowly but inexorably put the game to bed, never allowing Le Moyne to reestablish a foothold after Pitino’s early timeout. Even the Santa Clara game featured Roddie Anderson III going HAM in a 19-point loss; today he was joined by three other double-digit scorers who helped support his monumental effort despite Jovan Milicevic and Filip Borovicanin having uncharacteristically poor showing on the offensive end.

With this game out of the way, all eyes turn to the first Crosstown Shootout of the Pinito Era. Wes Miller is hanging by a thread at UC, having not made the NCAA Tournament in his four seasons in charge. What better way for Richard Pitino to put his stamp on the program than by driving coffin nails into the employment status of his rival’s head coach.