Bensley Joseph Comes Up Big Late in Providence's Overtime Win at DePaul
Friars come from down eight with under four minutes left in regulation with Joseph, Bryce Hopkins, and Oswin Erhunmwunse stepping up.
In paying a compliment to DePaul head coach Chris Holtmann after Providence pulled out a 70-63 overtime road victory, Kim English may have revealed a little something about the adjustment his program has experienced incorporating eight new players into the rotation.
“Last year’s game meant nothing,” English said when asked about preparing for a completely revamped DePaul team that aims to spread defenses out with shooting from positions one through five. “Coach Holtmann has done a great job. It is a challenge getting transfers to buy into what you are trying to do, and a lot of programs are going through it right now. No fault of the transfers, it’s just a challenge and he’s doing it with every single player.”
Through 11 games, it’s fair to say it’s been a mixed bag for Providence’s transfer haul. English and his staff moved with conviction last spring in bringing in a graduate transfer, two seniors, and a redshirt sophomore. Through the first month of the season, the Friars have really only gotten consistent production out of one: point guard Bensley Joseph.
Joseph has come pretty much as advertised. He’s defended at a high level, plays without much fear or hesitation, and has upped his scoring (12.5 from 9.6) and kept his rebounding (3.4/3.4) and assist (3.5/3.4) numbers virtually identical from last year at Miami.
Lost within the horror of falling to URI on Saturday, Joseph was the best Friar on the floor at the Ryan Center with 16 points, three rebounds, and three assists, and he was even better in Tuesday’s critical win over the Blue Demons with 20 points, seven assists, four rebounds, and all sorts of big plays when the Friars needed it in the second half and overtime.
No Friar has adjusted to the return of Bryce Hopkins better than Joseph, who has scored 48 points to go along with 12 assists and 6-14 shooting beyond the arc in those three games. He shot 71% against BYU, 53% at URI, and 50% last night.
Friartown was in meltdown mode before PC headed to Chicago, and when they trailed 56-48 with 3:37 on the clock we felt destined for talk of a lost season.
PC went on a 10-2 run over the next two and a half minutes, however, with Joseph assisting on 3-pointers from Jabri-Abdur Rahim to start the rally, and Jayden Pierre at the end of it as the Friars tied the game in the final minute.
During that 10-2 run Joseph had three assists and a layup — playing a part in all ten of Providence’s points. Fifteen of his 20 points came after halftime.
When the season felt like it was on the brink, Joseph did what he was brought here to do.
Bryce Hopkins Returns Home
Just three games into his return from a torn ACL, Bryce Hopkins was back in front of family and friends in Chicago.
He has been thrust into increasingly big minutes, seeing 29 against URI before playing 36 on Tuesday. Hopkins finished with his first double double (19 points, 10 rebounds, three assists) and buried three 3-pointers in the first half.
Hopkins struggled to finish around the rim, but English had a theory on that, “I think there’s been something — I remember a couple of years ago a Big East coach made a fuss about Bryce getting foul calls. He is getting hit at the end of his drives. He’s too good of a player, and he has too high of a stature to not go to the free throw line more.”
Hopkins shot 4-14 inside the arc against DePaul on Tuesday. There could be an element of his lift not being there, as Hopkins shot 53% from two last year, but the Blue Demons weren’t called for a foul until there were under two minutes left in the first half. PC didn’t make a free throw until the overtime session.
As for Hopkins not getting calls, this is something I highlighted all the way back in his first year with the program:
Here is what I wrote at the time:
Still, more and more it looks as though Hopkins is driving through contact and not getting the calls he was earlier this season. It’s as if he is being punished for being such a physical mismatch.
The numbers in Big East play certainly bear that out.
Through the first seven league games, Hopkins attempted 67 free throws.
In the seven since? That number has dropped to 29.
Providence was living at the free throw line for much of this season, and opposing coaches would be quick to point out that Hopkins, Devin Carter, and Ed Croswell still rank first, second, and fourth in conference play in free throw attempts per game.
Still, over the past five games Hopkins (who has led the league in FTA all year) is ranked 9th in the Big East in getting to the line — and there have been a number of times over the past few games in which he has seemingly drawn obvious contact and not gotten the benefit of the doubt.
Both Shaka Smart and Dan Hurley complained after Hopkins took 18 free throws against Marquette and 15 versus UConn three games later, and it has felt as though Hopkins hasn’t been the beneficiary of many calls since.
Oswin Erhunmwunse Steps Up
The success of Providence’s big men may be matchup-dependent this year. It became clear early in this one that Christ Essandoko would have trouble guarding the Demons and their shooting center David Skogman on the perimeter. Skogman scored 13 points in the first half on 3-4 shooting from deep and ended the game with 22 on six made threes. Essandoko was one of two Friars with a negative plus/minus — coming in at -11.
In Essandoko’s absence in the second half, English switched between going small with Hopkins at the five, buying some quality second half minutes with Eli DeLaurier, and saw the best performance of the season out of freshman Oswin Erhunmwunse.
DePaul didn’t feature the type of physical bigs that URI brought on Saturday, and Erhunmwunse flourished with 10 points, eight rebounds, three blocks, and two steals in 15 minutes. PC found him on multiple lobs throughout the game.
“He will do, literally, anything we tell him to do. He will try to do it exactly the way we say it, and when you get players with that level of humility they’ll have success,” English said of Erhunmwunse.
Needing More From the Rest
Tuesday was a mixed bag for Providence’s wings. For instance, Abdur-Rahim hit the 3-pointer to spark the late 10-2 run and dove for a loose ball and forced a timeout in between three Demons on PC’s final possession of regulation. Conversely, he traveled three times and took just one shot in seven first half minutes.
Wesley Cardet turned the ball over five times in 23 minutes and has fallen out of the offense since Hopkins’ return — 2-2 shooting in 16 minutes versus BYU, 1-3 in 18 minutes against URI, and 2-4 in 23 minutes last night. Cardet hadn’t been a high turnover player before last night, and the Friars really need to find a way to get him going. After scoring 30 points in the games against Oklahoma (17) and Davidson (13), Cardet has 21 points in four games and has taken just 15 shots during that time.
Similarly, after a stretch in which he scored in double figures in four of five games, Corey Floyd Jr. has scored six points since Hopkins’ return and seen his minutes cut drastically. Floyd played 30+ minutes in five of PC’s first eight games, but has seen 22, 18, and 12 minutes since. He’s scored six points in the last three games on 3-9 shooting. He does have 13 rebounds in the past three games.
Floyd is a low turnover offensive player (nine in 11 games) who defends and seemed to have found his niche in the offense in November, but he is getting squeezed at the moment. Like Cardet, there is more there with Floyd and PC will need to find it to take another step forward.
English showed a high level of trust in Rich Barron over the final five minutes, and gave cameos to Justyn Fernandez and Ryan Mela in the first half.
“Justyn Fernandez has been incredible. He’s been an absolute pro being out of the rotation the last few games. He’s been our hardest worker. He’s been incredible in practice. He’s been positive. I just thought he deserved to play, deserved a look,” English said.
Providence twice rallied from monster DePaul runs — 17-2 in the first half and 17-4 in the second.
English did little to hide the disgust he had in the URI game, twice referencing his team’s inability to execute the game plan on the defensive end. Unlike against URI, Providence was able to adjust when things went sideways on Tuesday night.
“We did nothing we wanted to do defensively that game. Nothing,” English said. “We explained to our team as coaches we can’t make adjustments if you don’t do what we want to do. So, at halftime we just had to do it, and we did it better.”
Friars set to wrap up big four-game stretch at Mohegan Sun
Heading into the four-game run of BYU, at URI, at DePaul, and St. Bonaventure on a neutral court, a 3-1 outcome following an 0-3 mark in the Bahamas would have been one most Friar fans could live with.
PC has a chance to do just that on Saturday when they had to one of their homes away from home at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut.
The Bonnies are off to a 9-1 start, but haven’t played an opponent the caliber of Providence.
