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Sophomore guard Chris Wright

PHILADELPHIA – Take a look at the stat sheet and see that Georgetown turned the ball over a whopping 25 times – including eight by junior forward DaJuan Summers. Note also that the Hoyas scored six points over the final nine minutes, and allowed Villanova to get to the line 27 times. Then recall that this season has been defined by poor execution down the stretch, and you can just about chalk this one up as another close-but-no-cigar loss.

Something strange, however, happened here at the Wachovia Center Saturday afternoon. Each time it looked as if the Hoyas were ready to roll over and hand the No. 10 Wildcats their 12th Big East win of the season, Georgetown did just enough to hang on – and no more.

After sophomore guard Chris Wright scampered away from swarming Wildcat defenders ready to foul with three seconds left, the final buzzer sounded and the scoreboard showed the Hoyas ahead 56-54 – Georgetown improved to 15-12 overall and 6-10 in the league.

Thanks to the nation’s No. 1 strength of schedule rating, according to realtimerpi.com, the Hoyas keep their NCAA tournament hopes alive.

With the loss, the Wildcats fell to 23-6 (11-5), although they remain safely in fifth place in the league.

“It feels good sitting here right now,” Head Coach John Thompson III said after the game. “There were [games earlier in the season] where we played well for long stretches and we would get a three-minute segment, a two-minute segment, a four-possession segment that would end up costing us the game. And so I think that hopefully the growth is showing.”

Chris Wright, as he has done so much lately, carried Georgetown for much of Saturday’s affair. Offensively, he chipped in seven first-half points, scored on a beautiful finger roll with 51 seconds left to put Georgetown up 54-51 and knocked down a pair of crucial free throws with 10 seconds left.

He did not turn the ball over during the game’s final eight minutes.

“It feels real good [to win], especially on the road in a hostile environment,” Wright said after the game. “Wins – we need wins. It was nice the way we won, and we closed that game out. In the past we’ve given up games like that and that’s just how it is, and we closed it out today and that was, I think, big for us.”

Defensively – and it was on the defensive end of the court where the Hoyas made their loudest statement Saturday – Wright harassed junior guard Scottie Reynolds for much of the afternoon, limiting the Wildcats’ best guard to 12 points on 2-for-10 shooting and forcing him to turn the ball over 10 times.

“As Coach [Thompson] said, Scottie is a good player,” Wright said. “I just wanted to make it tough for him and make every shot a contested one and force him into the help and not let him get in his comfort zone. He’s very effective if he gets a couple shots, gets a couple steals, a couple layups, he gets very effective and can score in bunches. I just try to limit his touches in good spots.”

“When someone’s taking away your threes like that, you gotta be able to go inside and we didn’t,” Villanova Head Coach Jay Wright said.

While Reynolds struggled on the perimeter, Wildcats’ leading scorer Dante Cunningham was stifled inside. Although he still managed to tally a team-high 13 points and nine rebounds, he had just seven shot attempts, four of which came before halftime.

Credit that to Georgetown’s interior defense, especially that of Monroe.

“They did a great combination of pressuring, giving help,” Cunningham said. “They have length and seemed to be everywhere, in the post, on the perimeter giving ball pressure. They seemed to be doing everything.”

“Monroe is always in the back just waiting for a ball to come in there,” he added.

Villanova’s super sophomore shooters, Corey Fisher and Corey Stokes, were also stifled. Fisher made 2-of-8 from the field, including 1-of-3 from deep, while Stokes could only stroke 1-of-7, with his lone three coming with 3.9 seconds remaining.

In one of the ugliest games of the season, a game that saw a combined 45 turnovers, 25 missed threes and 35 fouls, the Hoyas were paced by Wright and Summers, who scored 16 points on 5-of-8 shooting (3-of-6 from deep). Freshman guard Nikita Mescheriakov set a career high with 11 points, including two three-point plays and a three-pointer.

After leading 32-27 at the break, Georgetown built a 40-32 lead 2:21 into the second. They nearly coughed it up but extended the lead back to eight with 9:22 remaining.

From there, Villanova forced a shot clock violation, scored on a Reggie Redding follow-up, forced a Georgetown travel, and after a pair of empty possessions, scored on another Redding layup, this time in transition. Summers threw a lazy bounce pass on the next Georgetown trip and then committed a foul, sending Dwayne Anderson to the line, where he made both free throws to pull Villanova within two with 6:46 left.

The Hoyas bent but did not break. The lead did not go back under two until a Stokes free throw made the score 52-51 with 1:15 left. Then Wright came through with his finger roll.

For the first time in over a month, the Hoyas closed out a quality opponent.

“It represents a turning of the corner,” Thompson said. “. . . I think the key point of this game was actually the seven-minute mark where we thought about regressing, and then our guys held on and I thought we did a pretty good job.”

The Hoyas finish the regular season at St. John’s (14-15, 5-11) on Tuesday and home against DePaul (8-21, 0-16) next Saturday. If Georgetown can beat those two basement-dwellers, it stands a good shot of entering the Big East tournament as the 11th seed. A decent run there and the Hoyas can still advance to the Big Dance.

Thompson, though, is still thinking in the here and now.

“We just have to win our games,” Thompson said. “I don’t know this to be a factor, but I feel like we’ve played the toughest schedule in the country. . I think at the end of the day . we’re going to be one of the best 65 teams, despite what’s happened the last month. There’s no doubt about that.”

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