I was skeptical from the beginning and I’ve seen nothing to make me not be skeptical.
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I think we understand why Jay Wright retired now.
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Inheriting a team where Caleb Daniels is your best player and expectations are to be a top ten team every year is a tough go.
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Should’ve hired Nicolas Coston.
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They should still be better than they are. Whitmore is a lottery pick. Daniels, Dixon and Slater are solid. That team is still more talented than the majority of teams that they have played and lost to this year. I think Jay Wright would have a much better record right now
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Whitmore has played in 10 games. They were 2-5 without him.
Dixon, Slater and Daniels are 4th/5th best player sort of high-major players.
I just don’t think there’s very much there.
And there is at Temple, Portland, Oregon, Marquette, Depaul?
UConn, Xavier and Iowa State are tough. MSU was on the road so whatever I’ll give them that one. But they have 9 losses when their talent says they should have no more than 4-5.
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I mean they went across the country without Whitmore and got smoked. It is what it is. Maybe they should be 10-7 instead of 8-9, losing to DePaul sucks… I just don’t think the team is good enough to do anything.
Chris Arcidiacono is playing 30 minutes per night.
The little Arcidiacano is starting for them. He absolutely stinks. Like Jace Howard level bad but without decent size or strength.
Looks like the defense is the problem and I haven’t watched enough of them to have a strong opinion but I would think Jay Wright would have them better than 128th on defense. But also all their bad losses came without Whitmore (until last night).
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They also can’t shoot because they have no good players. 
I’m not sure what is a more damning indictment: Caleb Daniels being your go-to guy or Chris Arcidiacono being a starter.
Together that is an ugly situation.
I feel like the comp would have been if Juwan Howard’s first season he had the same roster just without Isaiah Livers and Zavier Simpson.
I still think you’re cutting Neptune too much slack for being 8-9. Just throw your hands up and say nope, nothing he could do. I’d be stunned if Jay Wright didn’t take the exact same players and go like 12-5.
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Jay Wright is an awesome coach, so maybe they would win a few more games along the way. It’s still a crappy roster that has played 10 of 18 games away from home, though.
It’s not like this should be an NCAA Tournament team or Big East contender IMO.
No good players seems a tad harsh. I agree they’d be better served as 3-5th options instead 1-2 but Dixon’s getting you 16 and 6 on 50/37/83 splits. He is good. Daniels has to do way more than you’d like him to have to do but even he’s been very productive. If their lottery pick was playing like a lottery pick then Daniels and Dixon become 2 and 3 and that doesn’t feel very far off from the top 3 options on the contenders in the Big East.
No quality depth is how I’d phrase it. But Slater, Longino and Armstrong were all top 50ish recruits that just haven’t been good. Arcidiacono shouldn’t be playing 30 minutes a game even with this roster and that’s prob an indictment on Neptune. Getting Justin Moore back might fix a lot of this but seems like he may just never return.
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Looks like Kyle Neptune picked a bad year to stop sniffing glue.
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I just remember writing a lot about Villanova last year and I would have never imagined that a team built around Caleb Daniels and Eric Dixon would be a good team.
I’m sure that they’ll pick off some nice wins as Whitmore adjusts to coming back and gets used to the college game but playing such a difficult non conference mostly without him is a tough break.
If you had Moore and Whitmore healthy all year, sure it could have been a better team. Just doesn’t seem like that’s ever happening.
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Problem is that is not really acceptable at Villanova so I’m not sure he is going to get a ton of rope there despite what the roster may look like.
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I get that sentiment (and again give Jay a lot of credit for slipping out when he did) but what is the alternative?
I think you have to at least see what Neptune does from a roster-building/portal perspective.
What are long-term expectations for Nova? Wright took the program above and beyond its historical level. Obviously all it takes is one great coach, but perhaps the Nova of the future is more of a top-25 kinda program than top ten.
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Probably not great starting off knowing Moore isn’t around this year and Whitmore missed time.
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