It was after 11:30 p.m. Wednesday when Kyle Neptune, Eric Dixon, and Jordan Longino walked off a podium inside Madison Square Garden and headed back toward the Villanova locker room. The third-seeded Wildcats got past a seven-win Seton Hall team in the opening round of the Big East tournament despite 16 turnovers and two separate spells of nearly eight minutes without a made basket.

Eric Dixon scored all 19 of his points in the second half to help sixth-seeded Villanova beat No. 11 seed Seton Hall 67-55 on Wednesday night in the

Villanova saw their NCAA Tournament hopes extinguished with a 75-73 loss to Georgetown eight days ago. It marked the end of an inconsistent and overall disappointing regular season for the Wildcats. A deep run in the Big East Tournament, however, can change everything.

Pick a sequence, any sequence. There were enough micro moments in the first half that contributed to the final result to fill this entire space, so let’s stick to one stretch. Villanova had a 15-point lead inside of five minutes to go in the opening frame.

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NJ Benson helped lead DePaul over Georgetown on Wednesday night with 18 points off of the bench in a 71-67 win in the Big East Tournament. DePaul (14-18) will play No. 2 seed Creighton in the quarterfinals on Thursday.

The UConn Huskies play the Villanova Wildcats in the Big East Tournament. Thursday's game will be the third meeting of the season between the two teams.

NEW YORK, NY (WFSB) - The University of Connecticut men’s basketball teams begins its Big East Tournament journey on Thursday. Third-seeded UConn faces off against 6th-seeded Villanova some time after 9:30 p.m. at Madison Square Garden in New York. Fans can see the game on FS1. UConn is the defending Big East Tournament champion.