Once again, Georgetown (12-9, 2-6) had a winnable game. Once again, they come up short.
This time is came at the hands of Butler, who erased an 11 point Hoya lead to win, 69-64. Sean McDermott scored 25 points and grabbed 8 rebounds as the Georgetown defense continued to struggle. Several times, McDermott was left wide open which is why he shot 9-12 from the field, including, 7-10 from the free throw line. The most damaging three-pointer came when McDermott broke a 64-64 tie. Butler screened the screener for McDermott allowing him to get wide open. Hoyas head coach, Patrick Ewing, said “They ran a pick and roll. He slipped out. We switched. We talked about when we switch, we must come together so no one can get open like that. We got there too late.”
Everything defensively is too late for this team. When the Hoyas need to get a defensive stop, it doesn’t happen. They lost McDermott all night. After holding Kamar Baldwin to one point in the first half, Butler’s leading scorer scored 12 points in the second half. It was all too easy for him to knife his way into the lane.
“Our goal was to keep him (McDermott) off the three point line and we didn’t do a good job,” said Ewing. But, all too often, the Hoya covering McDermott would help off him. The Hoyas would’ve been better off walling the lane off against penetration instead of helping outside in.
The Hoyas are at the bottom of the Big East in almost every defensive based statistics not related to rebounding. Last night didn’t help. They Hoyas came into the game giving up 9.3 made three pointers per game. Butler (17-4, 5-3) made nine three pointers, in part, because the Bulldogs’ screening action confused Georgetown all night.
It’s been a tough season for the Hoyas and they definitely miss the transfers but no one is going to feel sorry for them. Ewing is relying heavily on seven players which means there’s a real possibility that they’ll grind down by the end of the season.
This puts even more importance on the Hoyas to pay attention to the details.
