Matt Hodge had 17 points and visiting Villanova never trailed in a 70-55 victory over La Salle on Wednesday night in Philadelphia in a Big 5 Classic Pod 1 contest.
It was the Wildcats’ 10th straight win over the Explorers and 19th in the last 20 meetings.
Duke Brennan had eight points and 13 rebounds for Villanova (4-1). He entered as the nation’s leading rebounder at 14 a game. Tyler Perkins had 13 points and Acaden Lewis added 12 for the Wildcats, who have won four in a row.
Eric Acker scored 17 points to lead La Salle (2-3), which has lost three in a row.
Villanova scored the first nine points, with Perkins collecting back-to-back buckets on a La Salle goaltending call and a put-back.
La Salle drew to 15-12 with 11:28 left in the half on an elbow jumper by Acker. That was as close as the Explorers would get.
The Wildcats led by five with 7:13 to go when Brennan and La Salle’s Justin Archer got tangled up underneath the basket, with Archer ripping the ball from Brennan and Brennan hitting the deck. Brennan appeared to get his hands stuck between the legs of La Salle’s Edwin Daniel who was running back up the court, sending him sprawling. After a review, Brennan was called for a flagrant-1 foul.
That call seemed to energize the Wildcats, who went on a 9-2 run to build their biggest lead of the first half at 32-18.
La Salle went on a 6-0 run in the final two minutes of the half to draw to 34-28, but Hodge drained a three with 10 seconds left to restore a nine-point Villanova cushion at the horn. Hodge made all three of his three-point attempts in the first half.
The lead was double figures for all but the first two minutes of the second half. La Salle didn’t make a three until the eight-minute mark of the game and finished 3-for-13 from distance and 43% overall. Villanova forced 16 turnovers and shot 52 percent from the floor.
The six Big 5 teams in Philadelphia — Villanova, LaSalle, Drexel, Temple Saint Joseph’s and Penn — match up in two different three-team pods in the regular season. The winners of each pod meet, as well as the second-place teams and third-place teams, in a tripleheader Dec. 6.
–Field Level Media
