In the four and a half seasons since John Thompson III took over as Georgetown head coach, it’s been nearly impossible to remember an occasion where so many things went wrong in one game.
But after the Hoyas’ stumbled into their longest conference road trip of the season with a 17-point loss at home to West Virginia, the bigger task right now would be finding a part of their game that doesn’t need work.
“Today was a blip,” said Thompson after the 75-58 loss to the Mountaineers. “Today’s not the norm. It hadn’t been like that.”
Against West Virginia, Georgetown (12-5, 3-3 Big East) was outshot, outrebounded, turned over the ball too much, and never found its rhythm offensively. Even freshman center Greg Monroe’s 11 points, 8 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 blocks and 2 steals were overshadowed by 4 turnovers as he was physically manhandled from start to finish.
With so much evidence already in hand of his importance, opposing teams are focusing on limiting his touches, even if that means taking their chances with the rest of the Hoyas, who need to continue to run the offense and not give up on defense if and when shots don’t fall.
Take point guard Chris Wright, who finished without an assist for just the second time this season against West Virginia while racking up three turnovers. His only other game without an assist was against American, when he scored a career-high 22 points. Against the Mountaineers, he had 13.
“We gotta be able to still play through that adversity as a team and get offensive rebounds, start making shots, things like that,” said Hoyas senior forward DaJuan Summers.
Luckily, Georgetown’s first of three road games in seven days comes at Seton Hall (9-9, 0-6 Big East), a conference bottom feeder despite the scoring prowess of Jeremy Hazell (22.7 points per game).
The Pirates struggle in defensive field goal percentage, and they own the league’s worst rebounding margin.
In the end, blips are unlikely to punish teams such as Georgetown harshly when it comes to postseason hopes. But after becoming accustomed to improving with each game, the Hoyas’ first significant step backward is indeed a challenge.
