Seton Hall needs Bryce Aiken back before fans choose to boo again
Also: notes on Monmouth’s jump from the MAAC to the CAA.
NEWARK – The first boos materialized 7:31 before halftime, when Kevin Willard called his second timeout in a span of 59 seconds. Marquette had racked up five more points on two possessions since the first one, pushing its lead over Seton Hall to 26-10.
It wouldn’t be the only smattering of boos to rain down from the Prudential Center seats Wednesday, and while Seton Hall again found a way to play much better basketball in the second half, it lost 73-63 to its ranked visitors and fell to 3-6 in conference play.
According to Jerry Carino, it’s the first time Hall fans had booed the home team since 2016. Talk about a rare occasion – something reserved for only the most frustrated fans.
Jared Rhoden said he had no comment on the booing. Willard kept his concise.
“Well deserved,” the coach said. “Well deserved.”
The Pirates, once ranked inside the top 15 in the country, are now firmly the eighth-best team in their own league. But anyone who’s watched them this year can tell that the team who swallowed tough losses Monday and Wednesday is not exactly the same team that beat UConn, Texas, Rutgers or Michigan.
Guard Bryce Aiken missed a third straight game while in concussion protocol, and Kadary Richmond has struggled to shoulder a larger role as the team’s primary ball-handler. They embody different playing styles, with Aiken a terrific score-first guard and Richmond showing flashes of an elite passer. But Richmond has not been at his best over the past three games, when he’s had to play far more minutes to make up for Aiken’s absence.
Six turnovers Wednesday – bringing his personal total to 17 over three games. 4-of-9 shooting, which is certainly an improvement over his 0-for-8 performance Monday in the St. John’s loss, but a sharp contrast to what Aiken brings to the table. Five steals were a notable plus, but too many times he was out of position on defense, giving up an open 3.
“Kadary’s giving us everything he’s got,” Willard said. “It’s really hard to transition from playing 24 minutes a game to 39 minutes a game and taking on the whole load, and we’ve had to do that in a very short period of time. I’m seeing growth even though he’s struggling a little bit. He’s not making good decisions, but he’s making right reads and again, this is his first year of playing point guard in college and there’s always going to be a learning curve.”
Rhoden was asked how much the Pirates missed Aiken right now.
“Bryce gives us another option at the point guard position,” he said. “The past couple games, we’ve been getting pressured a lot. I think Bryce could’ve helped us contain it down and just level us out. Looking forward to getting another leader and another ball-handler and someone who can lead us like Bryce will again.”
You can read that like it’s shade directed in Richmond’s direction, or simply tough love, but I think it’s more about who Aiken is – a 25-year-old sixth-year player with more experience in Seton Hall’s program than Richmond, to boot. Richmond had to pick up a man-to-man defense when he arrived from zone-loving Syracuse, for instance; that’s just one of many things behind the scenes that the younger guard came in having to learn.
Aiken isn’t a panacea for all the Pirates’ present issues. Willard said he was “mystified” as to why some of his guys have been ball-faking open shots – a fair question to ask. Alexis Yetna had his worst night of the season, going scoreless with just three rebounds, and Tyrese Samuel wasn’t much better, so the less experienced Tray Jackson earned late-game minutes instead. And Rhoden’s shooting has been woefully cold.
But on paper, the former Harvard star should provide this team the element it’s been missing once he exits concussion protocol. That return could be around the corner, too: Willard revealed Wednesday that the Pirates thought Aiken would be back for the first St. John’s game, so the coach didn’t make many changes.
“It’s tough to try to make adjustments when you have three games in five days without him,” Willard said.
Concussions are serious and not easy to predict, but Seton Hall has five days between games before they return to the court Feb. 1 at last-place Georgetown, so Aiken could be ready by then. Maybe a new month will mean a new team – or, more accurately, a return to the team that was knocking down ranked opponents with poise.
Until then, fans, hold your boos to see which version of the Pirates will appear in February.
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As always, thanks for reading. Before the game Wednesday, I headed over to West Long Branch for Monmouth’s formal press conference commemorating their upcoming move to the Colonial Athletic Association. I’m dedicating today’s notes section to some overarching takeaways from Monmouth, with a deeper dive coming in Monday morning’s edition.
Per University president Dr. Patrick Leahy, Monmouth has three main reasons to be excited about the move: the consolidation of 23 of its 24 sports under one league’s umbrella, the expansion of its recruiting footprint (for student-athletes and students in general) and the associations it will make with other stellar universities. The first one is the most interesting to me. There are logistical reasons why having some sports here and other sports there becomes a headache, and for football in particular, the Big South wasn’t a geographic match for Monmouth and the competition wasn’t terrific. (With the introduction of a women’s rowing program, the Hawks will have 23 sports in the CAA and bowling in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.)
Why did Monmouth stand out on the list of universities the CAA identified? Commissioner Joe D’Antonio dubbed it a “totality of the circumstances” analysis with an array of factors making a difference, but the main items the CAA sought were geographic fit, academic success and commitment to improving the athletic program. A predictable list, to be sure, but the last point stands out in Monmouth’s case. The Hawks moved to Division I in 1982, relatively recently, and only formed a football program in 1993. The rapid rise of these athletic programs was spurred along by upgrades in facilities – the OceanFirst Bank Center opening in 2009 for basketball and other sports, a $16 million upgrade to Kessler Stadium in 2017 for football and lacrosse. It’s easy to draw a line from those investments to the “commitment to improve” idea.
I wondered what a timeline for this sort of realignment looked like from the initial idea to this week’s conclusion. D’Antonio said the CAA began forming a plan “over 15 months ago” focused on sustainability and ensuring the conference was positioned as one of the premier FCS/mid-major conferences in the country. That plan encompassed more than expansion, though, and it was only in August 2021 that Monmouth AD Jeff Stapleton received a call from the league and they had their initial meeting. Coaches were not involved until late in the process, and for confidentiality reasons only a few were looped in at all. “You confide in a couple of them, a couple of the senior members we have on our staff that we can talk to about, ‘Do you think this is a good move for Monmouth, just from a competitive standpoint?’” Stapleton said. Their answer was a resounding yes.
More coming on the basketball angle in Monday’s follow-up, but I asked King Rice if he’d consider scheduling New Jersey MAAC rivals Rider and Saint Peter’s next year after his program had left the conference. “I’m not scheduling them,” he began. “Shaheen (Holloway, coach at Saint Peter’s) keeps beating me. I won’t want to see Sha for a long time.” Jokes aside, the answer is they haven’t planned that far ahead. Rice said he’s friends with many MAAC coaches and went on to give a pretty insightful response; I appreciated his candor and want to share the rest in full:
“Sometimes it’s cool to play friends. We have to play each other because we’re in the same league right now. But when you’re not in the same league, the stress level goes up. This year I was fortunate to play Cincinnati, and Wes Miller is my brother. That game just makes it weird. We won the game and maybe that’s why it’s a little weird, because maybe we weren’t supposed to. But that’s hard on friendships. He did me a big-time favor by playing that game, and then on that night we beat them. That puts a lot of stress on him, he’s a new coach at that university and people start questioning stuff. Once I get to sit down with Jeff and President Dr. Leahy, they’ll give me some things to think about moving forward and what I need to do to move this forward for Monmouth University.”