BY JEREMY FUCHS
NEWARK — Seven games into their college basketball season and Seton Hall is undefeated.
With a big win at the Paradise Jam tournament, an impressive victory over George Washington and an 81-54 blowout of in-state rival Rutgers on Saturday at the Prudential Center, the Pirates have shown that there is plenty of talent to go around in South Orange.
Coming up, however, is a hellacious stretch of seven games that will test whether Seton Hall is truly ready to contend in the Big East and beyond.
The Hall travels to Wichita State on Tuesday to take on the No. 11 Shockers (5-1), who despite a loss to Utah on Wednesday are still by far the best team the Pirates will have faced all year.
The Shockers, who went 35-1 last year on their way to a second-round NCAA Tournament loss to eventual runner-up Kentucky in the tournament, will provide the biggest test for the Hall thusfar. A solid showing by the Pirates will go a long way towards proving their worth.
“I gotta watch Wichita State, get ready to be in a really tough atmosphere,” Coach Kevin Willard said Saturday. “Wichita State gets up and down.”
After Wichita State and a game against St. Peter’s—who blew out Rutgers earlier in the year—the Pirates will travel down south for a few games. They’ll first face South Florida (5-3), which has lost to decent teams in Alabama and North Carolina State, but are led by senior guard Corey Allen Jr., who is averaging nearly 16 points a game thus far.
A sneaky test awaits the Hall against Georgia in Athens. The Bulldogs are 5-3 and ranked 46th in Ken Pomeroy’s rankings, ahead of talented teams like Washington, Dayton and Providence. Senior forward Marcus Thornton is averaging 14.7 points and 7.3 rebounds and will be a load for Angel Delgado and Brandon Mobley to handle down low.
“Georgia is a very tough half court team,” Willard said.
The 1-6 Maine Black Bears will visit New Jersey after the road trip, a game the Hall should win handily. After that, though, the Big East schedule starts in earnest. The Hall starts with a game against St. John’s.
The Johnnies are now 6-1 after beating Syracuse on Saturday and ranked 29th in Pomeroy’s rankings. Star players D’Angelo Harrison, who is averaging 17.5 points and nine rebounds per game, and Rysheed Jordan, who is averaging 16 points, represent tough challenges for Isaiah Whitehead and company.
Right after the New Year, the Pirates will have one of their best opportunities to see how they stack up in a surprisingly deep Big East. No. 10 Villanova is undefeated. The Wildcats have big wins over VCU and Michigan and are ranked No. 6 in Pomeroy’s rankings, ahead of powerhouses like Arizona, Kansas and Texas.
For many of the young players on this squad, this will be their first real test.
“Just stay poised,” Mobley said when asked what he told the young players about this upcoming stretch. “This is going to be their first true road game. Enjoy the moment. It’s all going to be fun. Just need to take advantage of the opportunity.”
Seton Hall will not come out of this stretch unscathed. A trip to Wichita against a Shockers team coming off their first regular season loss since March 2013 will be difficult. Georgia is a surprisingly tough game. The start of the Big East schedule, with the two challenging games against St. John’s and Villanova, will not be easy.
But for Willard, who is attempting to position the team as an NCAA tournament contender, the next month will reveal a lot about his team.
“I want these guys to understand what it’s like to play a very tough road game,” Willard said. “I want them to get used to the Big East schedule. We’ll be in Tampa and Georgia for seven days. This is what the league’s going to be like. The schedule was designed to get them ready for Big East play. We will definitely face some adversity on Tuesday night. How they respond, how they dig in, that’s all going to be part of the learning curve. I’m excited to see what they do. We’ve never been in that situation. It’s as tough a home court advantage as there is in college basketball. They’re going to get punched in the mouth at some point on Tuesday night.”
It will also be a good test for Whitehead. Whitehead was by far the best player on the floor against Rutgers, scoring a career-high 25 with five assists, four rebounds and two steals in only 21 minutes of action. If Whitehead, the highest ranked New York City recruit since 2009, and the 14th-ranked player in the country on the ESPN 100, is to thrust the Hall back into prominence and back into the NCAA Tournament, then the upcoming seven games will gauge his stellar start.
“We’re Seton Hall,” Whitehead said. “They could be ranked one, two, we’re still going to go battle.”
Photo: Jim O’Connor/USA Today Sports
