Category: Villanova

Villanova football might be running out of time.

In a game where Villanova was favored to win by two or more possessions, it traded scores with Morgan State all the way until the final seconds of regulation. With 2 seconds left, Villanova sophomore kicker Dom LeBlanc attempted a 47-yard field goal to force overtime. However, LeBlanc missed just his second attempt of the season, and Villanova fell to Morgan State, 38-35.

The loss marked the Wildcats’ fourth consecutive home defeat.

Villanova (2-4) has yet to win consecutive games this season and has not won inside Villanova Stadium since last November.

“Yeah, I mean, just trying to give us a chance to tie the game,” graduate quarterback Pat McQuaide said on the last drive. “We have a ton of confidence in our kicker. I mean, he’s been great all year, and we still have a ton of confidence in him. I mean, the goal was to get an opportunity to tie the game and go to overtime. Or if there was an opportunity, to score a touchdown. Obviously, you want to do that. Like I said, he’s still our guy, and I’ll still take him 10 times out of 10.”

McQuaide completed 22-of-28 pass attempts for 266 yards, marking the most passing yards the fifth-year QB has had since the season opener against William & Mary. McQuaide also threw an interception after a pass breakup tipped the ball into the air, into the hands of Morgan State (4-1).

Morgan State quarterback Cameron Edge completed 31-of-41 passes for 444 yards and three touchdowns. His longest pass of the day was for 79 yards.

Villanova’s dual-headed backfield

Villanova’s running back duo of Ja’briel Mace and Isaiah Ragland combined for five touchdowns and 182 yards on the ground.

Mace rushed for 105 yards, which marked the first 100-plus-yard game from a Wildcat this season.

“Ja’briel and [Ragland] are unbelievable,” McQuaide said. “The guys in front did a great job. The offensive linemen with tight ends. Even the receivers, getting in there and blocking. Those guys do a great job every week. And Rags and Ja’briel are great players. And I’ve said this before, but they don’t do what they do without those guys in front of them. So you’ve got to give credit to everybody. It’s not just those two.”

Defense has its ‘highs and lows’

Villanova sophomore defensive back Jamie Tyson intercepted Edge in the end zone on fourth-and-7 with 2:45 left to play. At the time, Villanova led, 35-31.

The Wildcats were in position to win with a two-possession, while uncomfortable, lead.

Tyson’s interception came after Villanova’s defense allowed Morgan State to convert big, chunk yardage plays. The Bears had nine plays of 15 or more yards, with three of them being larger than 45 yards.

In comparison, Villanova only had four plays that were greater than 15-plus yards.

Morgan State would score the eventual game-winning touchdown on a six-play, 56-yard drive, which took just 1:15 off the clock..

“We weren’t consistent today,” Omari Bursey said. The redshirt sophomore linebacker led Villanova with nine total tackles (seven solo), one sack, one quarterback hit, and one tackle for a loss. “We had some great highs, but we had a good amount of lows too. So it’s kind of just, we got to stay steady.”

Up next

Villanova now has a bye week before returning to Patriot League play on the road against Fordham (1-5, 1-2 Patriot League) on Saturday, Oct. 17 (3:30 p.m., ESPN+).

“Yeah, we’ll see how our guys respond,” Ferrante said when asked about the upcoming week off. “I mean, they’re still in class next week, so it’s not like they have a week ‘off.’ And then we have an extra week to prepare for the next opponent, which is Fordham. So we’ll clean this up tomorrow, just like we do on every Sunday.”

The last time the two programs faced off was in 2015. Villanova defeated Fordham, 14-7, on the road in the Bronx. The Wildcats are 3-1 all-time against the Rams.

Isaiah Ragland has seen Villanova reach success during the junior’s first two seasons as a Wildcat, including last year’s run to the FCS semifinals.

This year has gotten off to a rocky start, as Villanova has fallen to 2-3 and 1-2 in the Patriot League, while also leading the conference in total penalties and penalty yards per game.

However, for Ragland, there is no lack of drive to turn things around as Villanova prepares for another nonconference matchup, against Morgan State on Saturday (1 p.m., ESPN+), before entering a bye week.

“We’re definitely hungry,” Ragland said. “As a team, we know it’s not the outcomes that we’ve wanted. But, it definitely has made us more hungry and made us more focused on the goals that we do have, not only for the future but right now — focus on the now.”

A bright spot for Villanova has been its backfield tandem of Ragland and Ja’briel Mace. A season ago, both were part of a running back by committee system, with David Avit and Isaiah Wright also getting carries. After Wright graduated and Avit transferred to Arizona State, it’s been the two juniors splitting the carries.

And the early results have been promising. They’ve combined for 555 rushing yards and five rushing touchdowns, with Ragland scoring three of the five.

“It’s been really good, because me and him feed off each other and we feed off the [offensive] line because we only go as far as [they] take us,” Ragland said. “We have a great line, great coaches, staff and our coaches push us and I like to push our line and they like to push us. I think it’s a great compliment to just feed off each other.”

Ragland was elected as captain by his teammates for the first time. For head coach Mark Ferrante, he has always trusted Ragland and has seen his growth on the field.

“He’s trying to lead,” Ferrante said. “Once [you’ve] been elected captain, you have a little added burden to your habits and practice in your communication with team members. … He does a really good job behind the scenes, he does a really good job communicating with the guys.”

Ragland admitted he was hesitant about speaking up in the past, but has learned with additional responsibility he needed to operate outside of his comfort zone.

“I’ve definitely been more of a lead by example type of guy, but I know if this team needs [it], you have to be comfortable with being uncomfortable and something I was uncomfortable with in the past has been talking more,” Ragland said. “I’ve definitely tried to step into that role a bit more and I think it’s definitely helping us for sure.”

But besides Villanova’s backfield, the Wildcats have struggled through the first five games. They allowed six sacks against Colgate. Quarterback Pat McQuaide has thrown five total interceptions, and the Wildcats have committed 44 total penalties.

Ferrante called Villanova its “own worst enemy” after last Saturday’s loss to Colgate. The Wildcats haven’t found their footing yet as they did last season.

“We got to keep working, keep grinding, keep tapping the rock as we like to say and hopefully, the rock will crack and we’ll get the results that we’re working towards and aiming for,” Ferrante said. “But right now, we haven’t done it consistently enough for four quarters.”

After experiencing successful seasons as an underclassman, the page has flipped for Ragland to be the guy to look up to.

“Just having the mindset to go 1-0, focus on that,” Ragland said. “Every game is not going to be an easy game. You got to respect every opponent you go against because it’s going to be a dogfight every time you go out there, but just having a ‘go 1-0′ mindset, think it’ll definitely help you.”

NEW YORK — The first thing worth mentioning is that most of the hoopla and prognosticating going on Thursday morning at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square is rather meaningless. The transactional nature of college sports — Villanova’s men’s team, for example, has two returning players — has made it so that trying to predict an order of teams, and which players will fill out the all-conference teams, is like throwing darts with one eye closed after several pints.

Kevin Willard at one point responded to a reporter who asked about scouting other teams that he had “no idea who is on anyone’s roster.” Surely he knows a few, but the sentiment was an honest one. Villanova won’t play a Big East game until Dec. 19, and Willard has to continue getting his new-look team ready for the start of its 12-game nonconference slate.

But where Villanova landed in the preseason coaches poll was fitting. The Wildcats are third, right where they finished last season, behind the 1-2 punch of Connecticut and St. John’s at the top of the Big East. Villanova went 15-5 in the conference last season, Willard’s first campaign as Villanova coach. St. John’s was 18-2 and UConn was 17-3. There was a clear top tier, a clear No. 3 in Villanova, and then the rest of the pack started with fourth-place Seton Hall at 10-10.

Willard took the data from last season and went to work in the offseason. The Wildcats lost just about every time they matched up with NCAA Tournament-quality teams. Blown out and beaten up at Michigan. Bullied twice by St. John’s. Beaten twice by UConn, which went to the Final Four. Not composed enough down the stretch in a tournament loss to Utah State. The offseason rebuild had a clear goal: Get bigger, more physical, more experienced.

Leading scorer Tyler Perkins is back, as is forward Matt Hodge, who is recovering from an ACL surgery. But the Wildcats are likely to roll out a five-man starting lineup one month from Thursday in Rome against Notre Dame with four newcomers. They include 7-foot-3 center Luigi Suigo, a 19-year-old freshman from Italy projected to be selected in the first round of next year’s NBA draft. Next to Suigo in the front court are two seniors who played three seasons of Big Ten basketball prior to transferring to Villanova in 6-10 power forward Kwame Evans Jr. (Oregon) and 6-6 forward Devin Royal (Ohio State). Junior Illinois-Chicago transfer Elijah Crawford is projected to start at point guard next to Perkins.

The bench has two senior guards in Jake Fiegen (Cornell), a sharpshooter, and a smaller scorer in Buddy Simmons (St. Bonaventure), who scored 16.4 points per game last season. Hodge will be a 22-year-old redshirt sophomore whose shooting prowess will be useful as soon as he’s ready to return from surgery. Freshman Adam Oumiddoch, a 6-5 guard, also will get minutes and contribute. Willard may play as many as 11 guys after finishing last season with an eight-man rotation that sometimes was more like seven. That final rotation had two freshmen, two sophomores, and a redshirt sophomore.

This team, by contrast, will start a junior, three seniors, and a freshman lottery pick, while the top of its bench rotation has two seniors and a 22-year-old redshirt sophomore.

Willard was open about what separated his roster from the better ones last season and what he had to do to rectify that.

So, gap closed?

“Absolutely,” he said Thursday. “I think in practice, if you come watch practice, the level of physicality, it’s almost a little bit too much. I haven’t practiced longer than 90 minutes so far. Just the experience we have, the games that these guys have played in, they understand what high-level basketball is all about.

“I think one of the issues last year was we were so young at times we just didn’t understand the physicality we were going to have to play. Last year’s group played with unbelievable heart and passion. It’s why we won so many games. It just wasn’t old enough and physical enough to be able to understand what you have to do to win at a little bit higher level.”

There’s a different understanding with this group.

“We already know the expectations that come with coming to Nova and what we have to bring every night,” said Evans, who has shed the walking boot he wore on his left leg during the team’s Summer Jam open practice in July.

Those physical practices and the different bodies Villanova has in the rotation are certainly noticeable to Perkins, who is back to full basketball activities after right shoulder surgery.

“It’s definitely an adjustment,” Perkins said. “This year when I drive the paint I got 7-3 Luigi Suigo and 7-1 Nico [Onyekwere, a reserve center]. It’s not every time you can get a layup. Shooting over them has also been something I’ve been noticing.”

A new roster with a new makeup also means the coach has changed his approach.

“It’s two total polar opposites,” Willard said when asked if his coaching style changes this year. “Last year’s team was really fun to coach because you had to do so much coaching and teaching. So from that standpoint it was really fun. This team is a lot of fun because they know what they’re doing.

“From that standpoint it’s a lot of fun because we kind of let them be who they are and the team can kind of evolve around their personalities instead of mine.”

What the personality of this team ends up being remains to be seen. The Wildcats begin a three-game exhibition slate on Oct. 11 at Rutgers and then open their season Nov. 1 in Italy. They have a measuring stick game on Nov. 21 vs. Michigan in South Philly and play at Kansas on Black Friday.

Are they ready for UConn and St. John’s? Are they ready to be back in the conversation at the top of a conference Jay Wright once lorded over?

Perkins had a pretty simple answer for what proving that looks like.

“Just winning games,” he said. “That’s what it takes, to win games.”

NEW YORK — The finishing point from the end of last season is where the Villanova men’s basketball team starts — at least on paper — to begin the 2026-27 basketball season.

The Wildcats landed as expected in the third spot behind Connecticut and St. John’s in the preseason Big East coaches poll announced Thursday morning in New York at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square.

St. John’s went 18-2 in Big East play last season, UConn went 17-3, and third-place Villanova was 15-5. Fourth-place Seton Hall, meanwhile, was 10-10. Villanova’s offseason was spent reloading a roster in the hopes that the Wildcats, who reached the NCAA Tournament in Kevin Willard’s first season, close the gap between themselves and the top two teams in the conference.

The roster looks a lot different. Only two players returned, including senior Tyler Perkins, who was selected preseason first-team all-conference. Matthew Hodge, the other returning player, is recovering from ACL surgery.

Villanova will begin its season in Rome vs. Notre Dame on Nov. 1. Its new-look starting lineup is projected to feature Perkins and four new players: point guard Elijah Crawford, forwards Kwame Evans Jr. and Devin Royal, and Italian big man Luigi Suigo, a 7-foot-3 center who is projected to be a first-round pick in next year’s NBA draft. Evans and Royal were both named to the all-Big East second team announced Thursday.

UConn received eight first-place votes while St. John’s received two and Marquette got one. Coaches cannot vote for their own team.

Wildcats women picked second

Like the men, Denise Dillon’s Villanova women’s team also is where it was at the end of last season: staring up at powerhouse UConn from the No. 2 spot.

The Wildcats received one first-place vote, which had to be from UConn coach Geno Auriemma, considering the rest of the first-place votes went to the Huskies.

Villanova had its fifth consecutive 20-win season last year. The Wildcats finished 25-8 and 16-4 in Big East play. They reached the NCAA Tournament and lost a first-round game to Texas Tech.

Leading scorer Jasmine Bascoe, a junior guard, is back after averaging 18.9 points and 4.0 rebounds. She was a unanimous first-team all-conference player last season and landed on this year’s preseason all-Big East team alongside sophomore guard Kennedy Henry.

The full men’s and women’s preseason polls are below:

(Points in parentheses)

Men

• UConn (98)
• St. John’s (90)
• Villanova (81)
• Marquette (73)
• Providence (59)
• Xavier (54)
• Creighton (47)
• DePaul (32)
• Seton Hall (31)
• Georgetown (27)
• Butler (13)

Women

• UConn (100)
• Villanova (90)
• Creighton (78)
• St. John’s (68)
• Seton Hall (67)
• Marquette (60)
• Providence (38)
• Georgetown (36)
• Xavier (29)
• Butler (21)
• DePaul (18)

Villanova coach Mark Ferrante says the Wildcats have become their “own worst enemy.”

The Wildcats returned home to Villanova Stadium for the first time in four weeks, searching for their first win home win since last November. After a competitive first half, costly penalties, an inability to stop Colgate on third down, and communication miscues led to a 28-21 loss.

It’s the first time Villanova (2-3, 2-1 Patriot League) has lost to Colgate (4-1, 3-0) since 1978, snapping an eight-game winning streak.

“We’ve got to stop being the opponent [to] ourselves,” Ferrante said.

Graduate quarterback Pat McQuaide completed 12 of 23 passes for 192 yards, two touchdowns, and an interception. McQuaide had a couple of opportunities for big plays with open receivers downfield, but overthrew them.

Running backs Ja’briel Mace and Isaiah Ragland combined for 98 rushing yards on 23 attempts. Ragland picked up a rushing touchdown in the first half, while Mace hauled in a touchdown catch.

“But, again, the one-two punch didn’t get us the win today,” Mace said. “So, I mean, the most important thing to me is winning football games, and we’re not doing that right now. We need to be better.”

Time not on the Wildcats’ side

The Wildcats were unable to retain possession of the football. Colgate led Villanova in total time of possession by over 15 minutes. A main factor in the discrepancy was the Wildcats’ inability to stop the Raiders on third down, allowing them to go 8 for 15.

“We’ve got to get off the field on third down on defense,” Ferrante said. “I would say [our opponents] are averaging over 50% against us in the first five games in third-down conversions, and too many of them [are] because of penalties.

“Looking at the stat sheet, 8 for 15, that’s more than 50%. Time of possession is ridiculous. We need to get off the field on defense. We need to stay on the field and hang on the football on offense.”

Through its first five games, Villanova has allowed every opponent except one to convert at least 50% of its third downs. The only game under 50% was against Bucknell in Week 2 (30.8%).

Penalties continue to derail momentum

Villanova has struggled this season with penalties. The Wildcats have committed seven or more penalties in four of their five games.

Against Colgate, Villanova was penalized eight times for 79 yards. Some of those came on third downs when Villanova had the opportunity to force Colgate into punting or settling for a field goal.

“We have to be smarter,” Ferrante said. “We have to be more disciplined. We’re giving up too many first downs in big plays because of our penalties. So we’ve got to make sure, No. 1, we stay outside so we don’t give them a free 5 yards and move the sticks, and No. 2, during the course of the play, we’ve got to make sure that we’re playing clean football as opposed to giving them pass interference calls and hand-to-face calls and personal foul calls.”

Villanova’s offensive line

The program has emphasized a strong offensive line in successful seasons.

But the offensive line has been hit with injuries. That was evident on Saturday, as McQuaide was sacked six times, including on the Wildcats’ final play to seal Colgate’s win.

At times the pass protection was there, but it was not consistent enough. And the run game was affected, too: No Villanova running back has eclipsed the 100-yard mark this season.

Last season, Villanova running backs had seven 100-plus-yard rushing performances.

Up next

Villanova will stay on the Main Line for a nonconference matchup against Morgan State (3-1). The Bears are coming off a bye week.

Villanova last faced Morgan State in 2014 and defeated the Bears, 48-28, at Villanova Stadium.

It could be a Patriot League team, a nonconference opponent, or an FBS school, the mentality doesn’t change for Villanova coach Mark Ferrante: “The schedule is the schedule.”

The Wildcats have played two conference games, losing to William & Mary and defeating Bucknell, and two nonconference games, a 59-13 loss to Louisville and a 20-16 win over Long Island on Saturday.

“The nonconference is the nonconference, the in-conference is the in-conference, our approach always has been [the same],” Ferrante said. “We’re going to play who’s on our schedule [and] it shouldn’t matter. You only get so many guaranteed opportunities. You want to try to create more opportunities for yourself at the end of the year, but you better be where your feet are.”

After facing Colgate (3-1, 2-0 Patriot League) at home on Saturday (2:30 p.m., ESPN+), a final nonconference matchup against Morgan State awaits on Oct. 3.

Ferrante is happy the Wildcats are finding ways to win close games with one-score wins over Bucknell and LIU, but he said there is work to be done to play a complete 60 minutes.

“It’s just more consistency,” Ferrante said. “We get great field position, let’s score the touchdown instead of having a turnover. Just got to start feeding off each other a little better, play more complementary football. I hope it’s still a work in progress, and I hope it’s starting to come, but we have not played a full, consistent four quarters yet in any game.”

Villanova also started 2-2 last season before reeling off 11 straight wins and reaching the FCS semifinals.

Even with retaining a majority of the 2025 squad, Villanova is still finding its identity.

“I think they’re starting to realize that they’re not last year’s team,” Ferrante said. “Teams aren’t going to just roll over because Villanova’s coming to town. Teams are going to play harder because Villanova’s coming to town, so we just have to play our game, not play to the level of our opponent.”

Penalties have plagued Villanova. The Wildcats have been called for 36 penalties for 305 yards while their opponents have been flagged for 22 penalties for 230 yards.

“We just got to play a little smarter, with a little more focus,” Ferrante said. “Especially the false starts or the offside on offense and defense, respectively. That’s just focus, those are mental penalties [so] we got to clean that up.”

After a rough start against William & Mary, quarterback Pat McQuaide has bounced back with 607 yards passing, four touchdowns, and one interception over the past three games. Sophomore wide receiver Brandon Binkowski is having a breakout season with 18 receptions for 259 yards, while junior running backs Ja’briel Mace and Isaiah Ragland have combined for 457 rushing yards and four touchdowns.

Ferrante believes cleaner football is on the way.

“It’s just little inconsistencies here and there, whether it’s penalties, whether it’s turnovers, whether it’s just not playing with the same level of intensity from one quarter to the next,” Ferrante said. “But you see the improvement in practice and you hear some of the comments that are being made amongst themselves in practice. I think we’re heading in the right direction, we just got to put it on a field on game day.”