Villanova has a Justin Moore problem.
It's painful to acknowledge, because one he's done so much for the program and two he's clearly not 100%. You have to give him credit for wanting to gut it out and try to help the team. But he simply isn't able to right now.
Over the last five games, Moore is averaging 4.8 ppg. He's shot 8-36 (22.2%) overall and 2-17 (11.7%) from three. He's a -26 over that span, averaging a -5.2 per game.
The bigger issue, in my opinion, is mistakes being made that aren't physical. The most glaring example is his late foul against Xavier where he reached in on a driving Quincy Olivari. A player with his experience has to know better there and find a way to challenge the shot without fouling. He certainly has to know you can't reach there. Another example is the poor shot he took late in the first half of the first loss to Marquette that gave the Golden Eagles a buzzer-beating layup and a huge momentum boost. There was no way that Marquette should have gotten another shot in the half, and someone with the experience of Moore HAS to know that. Even if he's limited physically, he should be able to make some kind of positive impact with his knowledge and experience, but that's just not happening right now. Again, it's one thing to not be the scorer or defender that he was pre-injury, but to be hurting the team with mental mistakes is concerning.
I'd also like to argue that his mere presence provides a boost, that him being out there provides some stability, some confidence, some smoothing of execution. Intuitively, it makes sense. But there's just not a whole lot of evidence indicating any of that is happening right now.
As crazy as it sounds, and as much as it hurts to acknowledge, it's hard to justify him being out there in crunch time at this point. It's an incredibly delicate situation for Kyle Neptune to handle, and I don't envy his position. But you have to consider making a drastic change at this point.
It's painful to acknowledge, because one he's done so much for the program and two he's clearly not 100%. You have to give him credit for wanting to gut it out and try to help the team. But he simply isn't able to right now.
Over the last five games, Moore is averaging 4.8 ppg. He's shot 8-36 (22.2%) overall and 2-17 (11.7%) from three. He's a -26 over that span, averaging a -5.2 per game.
The bigger issue, in my opinion, is mistakes being made that aren't physical. The most glaring example is his late foul against Xavier where he reached in on a driving Quincy Olivari. A player with his experience has to know better there and find a way to challenge the shot without fouling. He certainly has to know you can't reach there. Another example is the poor shot he took late in the first half of the first loss to Marquette that gave the Golden Eagles a buzzer-beating layup and a huge momentum boost. There was no way that Marquette should have gotten another shot in the half, and someone with the experience of Moore HAS to know that. Even if he's limited physically, he should be able to make some kind of positive impact with his knowledge and experience, but that's just not happening right now. Again, it's one thing to not be the scorer or defender that he was pre-injury, but to be hurting the team with mental mistakes is concerning.
I'd also like to argue that his mere presence provides a boost, that him being out there provides some stability, some confidence, some smoothing of execution. Intuitively, it makes sense. But there's just not a whole lot of evidence indicating any of that is happening right now.
As crazy as it sounds, and as much as it hurts to acknowledge, it's hard to justify him being out there in crunch time at this point. It's an incredibly delicate situation for Kyle Neptune to handle, and I don't envy his position. But you have to consider making a drastic change at this point.