Nightcap makes tripleheader a `Classic'

The nightcap of Saturday's Big 5 Classic at the Palestra finally produced a Big 5 classic.

Basketball fans watching all three games of the tripleheader had waited all day. They'd seen tough little Drexel hang in against an older and athletically-superior La Salle squad. They'd seen Penn fall short in its bid to upset St. Joe's.

And then, in the only game on the docket that counted in the Big 5 standings, they watched Villanova upset Temple, 70-66.

"I want to make this interesting, but there's no other way to say it: Another classic Big 5 game, it's unbelievable," Villanova coach Jay Wright said.

Wright is in his first year at Villanova, and his first two Big 5 games were overtime losses to La Salle and Penn.

And for a time, it looked like Wright was about to go to his third overtime in as many games.

"I was ready for overtime, I definitely was," Wright said. "I was ready for overtime again."

He was ready thanks to Temple's furious comeback, led by Owls point guard Lynn Greer.

Having led most of the way, the Wildcats seemed to be in control with a 12-point lead and 10:12 remaining.

But then Greer took over, and the lithe six-foot-two guard from Philadelphia looked like he was about to be a real Big 5 hero.

Greer scored 15 of Temple's final 25 points, including consecutive three-point plays and the layup that tied the score at 66 with 52 seconds to play, and sent the Temple faithful into a frenzy.

"Lynn is our best leader, there's no question about it," Temple coach John Chaney said. "He's our best everything... He's one of the best basketball players I've ever had, for sure."

It was no surprise then, that after Villanova guard Derrick Snowden hit a long jumper to give the Wildcats a 68-66 lead with 21 seconds remaining, the ball was in Greer's hands.

Greer dribbled to the baseline on the left side of the court, where he found himself blocked by big Villanova forwards Brooks Sales and Andrew Sullivan. Greer tried to make his move, but he dribbled the ball off his leg and out of bounds, giving the Wildcats possession and the eventual four-point win.

"[Greer] just kept on [instead of passing], because he figured he was going to beat that guy," Chaney said. "But those guys kept in front of him. Can't fault him, he did everything else right, so he's entitled to misread one time."

Greer led the Owls with 29 points on 11-for-29 shooting. He also had a team-high seven assists.

The game turned on the Wildcats' shooting. Villanova made an astonishing 59 percent of its shots from the floor against Temple's vaunted defense.

"We figure if you're going to beat us, you're going to beat us by shooting over us," Chaney said. "I've always believed that and I still believe that, even when teams do [shoot well]."

But Chaney didn't think his team's inability to shoot helped matters any.

"Our big guys couldn't buy a basket," Chaney said. "You could sit their ass on top [of the hoop] and they couldn't drop their ass through it."

The Big 5 Classic's opener wasn't quite as exciting, but it did feature a couple of hometown performers.

La Salle senior forward Rasual Butler wowed spectators with 32 points and 11 rebounds. "He's a good player," Drexel coach Bruiser Flint said. "He's bigger than us. Our uniforms don't fit that well, we've got a couple little dudes out there, little scrawny cats."

Guard Mike Cleaves also impressed fans, as he knocked in 21 points on 9-for-16 shooting.

"This guy right here's got a big heart," La Salle coach Billy Hahn said, slapping Cleaves shoulder. "He's a warrior and he hit some big shots today."

At several points in the game, the Explorers seemed poised to dispatch the Dragons, but Drexel just wouldn't go away.

"We had a little trouble scoring, but we stayed tight," Flint said, adding that Drexel's 44 percent shooting from the outside helped the Dragons hang around. "That's our first time shooting the three, at all. We've been bricking all year."

Though the Dragons aren't technically members of the Big 5, Flint was delighted that his players got to be a part of the Classic.

"These guys don't know," Flint said, referring to his players. "I was actually in the Big 5, and it was awesome. They've cut a lot of good things out. Like they used to have streamers and rollouts, but the NCAA cut that stuff out."

When a journalist at the press conference asked what a rollout was, Flint replied, chuckling: "See you've never been here, either."

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.