College Basketball Podcast: Is it reasonable to call Villanova one of the best teams in recent history?

Gary Parrish and Matt Norlander look back at the season and title game -- and then ahead to next season

By Gary Parrish

Apr 4, 2018 at 2:17 pm ET • 2 min read

Donte DiVincenzo led Villanova to a 79-62 win over Michigan late Monday that secured a national title for Jay Wright's Wildcats. So everything you're about to read is true.

Villanova finished 36-4 and ranked No. 1 at KenPom.
Villanova only lost once all season with a starting lineup of Jalen Brunson, Phil Booth, Mikal Bridges, Eric Paschall and Omari Spellman -- and that one loss came when Butler shot 68 percent from 3-point range against the Wildcats at Hinkle Fieldhouse.
Villanova finished No. 1 in offensive efficiency with a rating of 127.8 -- which is 5.1 points better than anybody else and the second-highest adjusted offense number KenPom has ever recorded.
Villanova closed the season on an 11-game winning streak.
Villanova finished this season with two wins over the Big East champs (Xavier) — first by 24 points, then by 16 points. The Wildcats also beat the Big 12 champs (Kansas) by 16 points, the WCC champs (Gonzaga) by 16 points, the SEC co-champs (Tennessee) by nine points, and the Big Ten Tournament champs (Michigan) by 17 points. And they won all six of their NCAA Tournament games by double-digits -- specifically by an average of 17.7 points.

Add it up, and I think you can reasonably argue that 2018 Villanova is one of the best college basketball teams -- if not the best college basketball team -- of the modern era. So Matt Norlander and I discussed that at the top of this episode of the Eye On College Basketball Podcast.

From there, the conversation went like this:

20:12: How awesome were the Wildcats? So awesome that they didn't even play well in the title game, or get much from National Player of the Year Jalen Brunson, and they still be Michigan by 17 points. Insane. Villanova just made Michigan feel hopeless. The game was never in question the entire second half.
25:58: Donte DiVincenzo was the star of the game and Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four. He got 31 points on 15 shots against Michigan. He made 3-pointers. He dunked. He got a couple of blocks -- one of which was amazing. What does that mean for DiVincenzo's NBA Draft stock? And if he returns to school, does he enter next season as the face and name of college basketball?
35:39: Shame on the USA Today reporter who tried to turn tweets from a 14-year-old DiVincenzo into some sort of scandal. What a lame story that meant and accomplished nothing. Best night of DiVincenzo's life, and he spent part of it having to defend tweets from when he was kid. Then he deleted his entire account. The media, especially the mainstream media, should be better than that.
49:59: It was an interesting season, wasn't it? From scandal to the Trae Young phenomenon, from a No. 16 seed beating a No. 1 seed to the rise of Sister Jean, this season did not lack storylines. So Norlander and I looked back for a bit.
102:30: And we closed by discussing the CBS Sports preseason Top 25 (and one) -- where Kansas is No. 1, Duke is No. 2 and Villanova is No. 3. Which team do I have too high? Which team do I have too low? Which team should I have probably included but didn't? Norlander and I chop it up as news breaks that forced me to drop Auburn.

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