Welp… 1 and 0, technically.
This was a game played in three portions, two of which did not go Xavier’s way. The Musketeers came out of the gates incredibly slowly, looking every bit a team thrown together during the summer and placed under new management. With 13 minutes off the clock, Xavier’s offense was yet to show up. The team was shooting 3-18/0-7/3-4 and had committed 6 turnovers. There was no flow, no consistency, and no stand-out player. It was only because of Xavier’s defense and the low level of the competition that Xavier only trailed 15-9.
Then it clicked in. An offense that scored 9 points in its first 21 possessions reeled off 31 in its next 17, keying a 31-5 run that straddled the half.
It started with Malik Messina-Moore drilling a three, then nailing a pair of free throws the next time down. He missed from deep the trip after that, but Tre Carroll grabbed the rebound and split a pair on the ensuing trip to the line to draw Xavier level for the first time since 2-2. Messina-Moore scored again to send the game into the final media timeout, then Carroll hit two more free throws out of the huddle to extend the lead further. By the time Jovan Milicevic was hitting a pair of foul shots with under a minute left, X had ripped off a 20-1 run that was only tarnished by Elijah Lewis converting an and-one for Marist heading into the break.
It looked like a high major walking away with a buy game out of the half. All Wright canned a three, one of three he’d make on the day. Anthony Robinson hit a free throw, and Roddie Anderson III converted a steal into a bucket on the other end. Marist called a timeout less than a minute into the half. It didn’t matter. Xavier came out of that brief intermission with a 5-1 run, and a Jovan Milicevic three made it 40-20 with 16 and change to play. The announcing team confidently declared that the Muskies were on the way to another win in a home opener.
Apparently the team thought that meant the game was over.
Marist answered back with a 13-2 run in a stretch of seven possessions in which Xavier got one stop and scored one bucket. Xavier shot five threes in those seven trips down the floor, missing them all. For a team that was 7-26 (26.9%) from behind the arc on the night, they were all too happy to settle for threes while the Red Foxes were making a run. Suddenly a lead that looked insurmountable had withered to single digits.
Then Xavier got back to driving the ball. All Wright made a layup. Malik Messina-Moore scored and-one and then hit a jumper. In 10 possessions over 5 minutes after Marist cut it to 43-35, Xavier shot just two threes, both catch-and-shoot makes by All Wright, who was 3-4 from deep on the night. When the breaks were beating the boys, at least the boys had the good sense to stop chucking bricks from behind the arc.
Then the wheels well and truly fell off. The slide began with Roddie missing a three, the Anthony Robinson missing a pair of free throws and Messina-Moore grabbing the OReb and missing a layup. Tre Carroll collected an awful turnover, and Wright had his only three-point miss of the night. After Roddie threw the ball away again and Tre Carroll missed a three, a pair of free throws by Marist capped a 13-0 run that put them in the lead 60-59 heading into the final media timeout.
To Xavier’s credit, they did enough from there. Milicevic missed the front end but redeemed himself with a straight away three that put the home team back on top for good with 1:46 left. A perfect 4-4 from the line down the stretch and Xavier staggered across the finish line, having clung to a 66-62 victory in the first game of the Richard Pitino Era.
There are going to be growing pains for this team, this coach, this program. Nothing in the college basketball landscape is the same as it was even five years ago, and it’s hard to say where the future is going to go. Still, there’s no better potential outcome to opening day than being 1-0, and Xavier has accomplished that once again. Whatever the road ahead holds, this team has – only just – cleared the first hurdle.
