West Virginia: The Mountaineers’ 98-95 overtime loss at Pittsburgh was the most excusable of the defeats suffered by the Big East’s top four on this holiday weekend, but it was also West Virginia’s second-straight loss. It may come as a surprise to some that it’s WVU’s defense and not its offense that has been mostly to blame in the team’s five defeats.

You can see that West Virginia is allowing 0.085 points per possession more than it is scoring in its five losses. The main culprit is field-goal defense. Despite the Mountaineers’ notable length, they are allowing opponents to make 40 percent of their 3-pointers and 57 percent of their 2-pointers in these defeats. For the season, West Virginia is ahead of only the comparatively tiny Marquette and Providence squads in 2-point defense among Big East teams.

Also notable is West Virginia’s proclivity for putting its opponents on the foul line. Some of that is fouling late in games to try to come back, but a lot of it is just being foul-prone. I’ve written before about the link between a team’s willingness to foul and its ability to force turnovers, but WVU is not getting a consistent turnover payoff from its many fouls. An inability to force turnovers combined with putting opponents on the line and allowing a high percentage of makes from the field means that West Virginia is getting far too few stops for a team with eyes on a run to the Final Four.

Syracuse: I wonder how we’ll look back on the Orange’s 66-60 loss to Louisville come in the end of the season. There’s a decent chance that the most important effect of it was to get Louisville into the NCAA Tournament. The Orange still looks a likely No. 1 seed and remains favored to win the Big East regular-season title.

What have we really learned about Syracuse in the last two games — including the narrow and controversial victory over Connecticut — that was underexposed previously? John Gasaway shows that in the highly-offensive Big East, Syracuse actually has been quite mediocre on offense, at least in conference games:

That’s right — Syracuse has been about as good on offense as Providence and Pittsburgh in conference play, and, if you use the RPI, Syracuse has played an easier conference schedule than both teams. To score 1.08 points per possession might be quite an achievement in a conference where scoring wasn’t so prevalent — like the ACC or Big Ten — but the Big East average is 1.06 in conference games. The Orange is not the offensive juggernaut you may have been led to believe.

The primary problem is turnovers. Andy Rautins, Brandon Triche and Scoop Jardine all have unacceptable turnover rates, and not even the forwards can keep their rates below 18 percent. Among major-conference teams, only Georgia, North Carolina and Rutgers have allowed a possession to be stolen from them as often as Syracuse has. None of those teams will even be playing in the NCAA Tournament.

The loss to Louisville wasn’t caused by turnovers — though SU had 12 — or poor free-throw shooting from bigs Rick Jackson and Arinze Onuaku — they combined to take only two free throws; instead, Syracuse was bullied inside. Louisville hit 57.7 percent of its 2-pointers against the third-best 2-point defense in the Big East. The thing is, Louisville only attempted 26 2-pointers, as the Cards were much more willing to jack up 30 threes against Syracuse’s zone. The Cards only hit 30 percent, an ideal figure that should have led to a Syracuse victory, but the Orange could not close out possessions, which leads us to the potentially fatal flaw of the 2-3 zone: defensive rebounding.

Louisville had 38 missed shots open for rebounding and snagged 18 of them. Samardo Samuels and Jared Swopshire each had four offensive rebounds; Rakeem Buckles grabbed three more. It’s unlikely that a defense is going to be excellent at every aspect of defending, but it’s in games where the relative mediocrity of the offense is exposed that the Achilles’ heel of the defense becomes more problematic.

Georgetown: Rutgers’ offense is the third worst in the Big East in conference, scoring 0.97 points per possession. Georgetown’s defense is tied for the third best in conference, allowing 1.03 points per possession. Somehow Rutgers managed to score 1.14 points per possession to come up with the unlikely, 71-68 victory in Piscataway. Georgetown’s fatal flaw: turnover differential.

The Hoyas currently have the 12th-worst turnover differential of the 73 major-conference teams. Here’s a list of the major-conference teams that — like Georgetown — rank outside the national top 200 in both turnovers forced and turnovers committed: Iowa, Rutgers, Georgia, Southern Cal. That is not a list where one would expect a top seed to find itself.

Against Rutgers, Georgetown committed 14 turnovers and forced just eight. That difference – plus some big 3-pointers by RU — allowed the Scarlet Knights to make up for shooting a worse percentage and getting fewer rebounds than the Hoyas.

Turnover differential is not a new problem for Georgetown under John Thompson III. With the exception of the 2005-06 team, JT3’s offenses have always had turnover problems. A lot of that has to do with the number of passes in each offensive set. Teams that pass more — especially on the interior — and run longer offensive sets tend to turn the ball over more. On defense, last year’s team was the anomaly in that it actually forced turnovers. That team was led by the thieving of Jessie Sapp and Greg Monroe, but Sapp is now gone and Monroe isn’t picking up steals as frequently this season.

This turnover disparity forces Georgetown to be extra efficient everywhere else, especially since Georgetown is not a dominant or even a proficient rebounding team. The combination of mediocre rebounding and a poor turnover differential means that GU’s opponents are getting more shots than the Hoyas are.

Rutgers attempted six more free throws and one more field goal than Georgetown. For the season, opponents have attempted 96 more field goals than Georgetown. Despite attempting 96 more, opponents have 87 fewer makes, since the Hoyas are that good at making shots and forcing opponents to miss. What this creates, though, is a narrow margin for error, one that could be devastating against a quality opponent in the NCAA Tournament.

Villanova: Like Syracuse in its narrow victory over Connecticut on Wednesday, there were worrying signs for Villanova on Saturday in a win over Providence. The Friars, undermanned and underexperienced, hung with Villanova for 32 minutes, trailing by just four before a controversial personal foul/technical foul combination elimintated Friars’ fifth-year senior guard Sharaud Curry, who had 19 points on the day. Despite poor shooting from Providence, the Friars were able to hang in before losing by 11 thanks in part to Villanova’s overaggression on defense.

The Wildcats are now notorious foulers. Their games typically take more than two hours, 20 minutes to complete. Jay Wright has a deep bench, and so foul trouble isn’t as much of a worry, although Antonio Pena’s disqualifications do hinder VU on the interior. Against a Friars team not known for its ability to get to the rim and draw contact, Villanova still committed 23 fouls and allowed 33 free-throw attempts, this a week after Georgetown attempted 50 free throws in a 103-90 Villanova defeat.

On Big Monday, it was more of the same. UConn attempted 44 free throws, making 35, and giving the Huskies a 19-point advantage at the foul line in an 84-75 UConn victory. Pena and Corey Stokes both fouled out. Much like Louisville’s win at Syracuse, Connecticut’s victory is surely a bigger positive for the Huskies than it is a negative for the Wildcats, but Villanova’s proclivity for committing fouls is reaching epic proportions.

Of major-conference teams, only Colorado and Washington send their opponents to the foul line at a greater rate than Villanova does. We can only pray that the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee doesn’t matchup Villanova and Kansas State in the same bracket, because that game would have the potential of clearing three hours without any calls to the bullpen. At least Kansas State gets to the foul line more than any other team as it fouls its opponents. The Wildcats are just fourth in the Big East at getting to the line. In Big East play, opponents have gotten to the foul line 54 more times than Villanova has and scored 29 more points from the stripe.

If you’re looking for a recent example of a team with Final Four pedigree that fouled so much, you won’t find one. There were two Sweet 16 teams in 2008 with defensive free-throw-attempt-per-field-goal-attempt rates of greater than 46.0 (Villanova’s is currently at 49.7). That year, Western Kentucky (48.7) and, yes, Villanova (46.4) each made the Sweet 16 as No. 12 seeds despite being so foul happy. In 2007, Southern Illinois was a No. 4 seed and lost narrowly to Kansas in the Sweet 16 with an exact match (49.7) of VU’s FTA/FGA rate. In 2006, Billy Gillispie’s Texas A&M team won a game as a No. 12 seed over Syracuse with a rate of 48.5. That’s the extent of NCAA Tournament success for squads that even approach Villanova’s “foul”-ness since 2004.

Either Villanova must improve its ability to play defense without fouling, or it will risk losing big games at the foul line, ironic for a team that shoots free throws so well (eighth in the land at 75.8 percent). Either way, be sure to set your DVR to record at least an hour over in any game the Cats play for the rest of the season.

Two freshmen, Maalik Wayns and Isaiah Armwood, hit 3-pointers in the last two possessions to bring Villanova back from a late five-point deficit with 1:42 to play. The basket was Armwood’s first of his career, and it came after he was forced into action thanks to severe foul trouble for Villanova’s frontcourt.

The fouls were the main thing that made this game a strange one.

Those free-throw rates are borderline absurd. The two teams combined for 54 fouls committed. Nine players accumulated at least four fouls, including the four Villanova Wildcats who fouled out. Among those four were Antonio Pena, Taylor King and Maurice Sutton or, in other words, all the height in Villanova’s rotation since freshman Mouphtaou Yarou was sent back to Philly with a viral infection.

Perhaps the strangest aspect of this foul fest is that George Mason was just the 262nd most proficient team at getting to the line in the nation last season. Of Patriots returners, Ryan Pearson and Mike Morrison were the best at getting to the line, and yet they combined for just four of the 37 free-throw attempts for Mason. The Patriots made 27 or 73 percent of those. Villanova had 39 attempts, making just 23, 59 percent.

Because of the way the game was officiated, foul shooting played a major role down the stretch. At one point, Villanova missed four of five free throws in the game’s final minutes, but it was George Mason that saw its free-throw shooting betray it in the last possessions of the game. The Patriots went 4-for-8 from the line in the game’s final two minutes to keep Nova alive.

The second thing that sticks out in that box above is the rebounding. Villanova had 19 offensive rebounds, 11 more than George Mason, but it was 6-foot-1 Corey Fisher who led the Cats with five. Since Jay Wright likes to play small, the guards must crash the glass, and Fisher’s production is a positive step in the right direction. His aggressiveness on the floor also translated into 18 free-throw attempts, of which the junior made 14.

King, the transfer from Duke, had four offensive rebounds of his own, and the 11-offensive rebound difference allowed Villanova to make up for the 17 turnovers it committed to GMU’s 14. The first half was especially troubling to Wright as he saw his team full of veteran guards commit 11 in the opening 20 minutes. Reynolds had a nightmare first half. He ended the game with eight turnovers but was able to score 18 points after the poor start.

While the win was the key for Villanova on Thursday, my takeaway from this game is that Villanova really misses what Dante Cunningham and Dwayne Anderson brought last season. Those two players — and departed Shane Clark as well — were the Cats who were most adept offensively on the interior.

Cunningham hit 52.7 percent of his 463 2-point attempts in Villanova’s Final Four season, a total more than twice as many as anyone else on the team. Anderson hit 55.7 percent of his 132 attempts, and Clark made 52.7 percent of his 112 attempts. Of the rest of last year’s team, only Reggie Redding made at least half of his 2-pointers last season, and he won’t be back until the end of first semester. Therefore, it wasn’t a great surprise that Villanova made just 39.3 percent of its 2-pointers against George Mason.

On the defensive end, the problem is just as acute. Cunningham was the team’s best interior defender last season, and without him, the Wildcats did nothing but hack George Mason around the basket. Pena is notoriously foul-prone, and Sutton is very inexperienced, but foul-outs should be a rarity for King. Wright would prefer not to have to use King against opposing interior players, which means Pena needs to stay on the floor, and the 6-foot-9, 240-pound Yarou best get better quickly.

Villanova’s next opponent is Dayton on Friday. The Flyers are not a team that forces their way to the line, but its star, 6-8 Chris Wright, does draw fouls. Dayton is terrific at defending the rim, finishing third in the Atlantic 10 in 2-point defense last season. To win on Friday and consistently throughout the season, Villanova has to stay disciplined to keep its frontcourt on the floor, or the poor 2-point shooting and the excessive fouling is likely to be a problem that crops up periodically.

No. 3 Villanova vs. No. 1 North Carolina (8:47 p.m. ET)

Where Villanova can hurt North Carolina: On the offensive glass. Villanova is a balanced team, one that doesn’t excel at any one thing — except perhaps free-throw shooting — and isn’t awful at anything, though the Cats do send their opponents to the line a bit too much. Therefore, pinpointing a distinct Nova stylistic edge isn’t simple, but it may surprise you that it’s on the offensive glass where the Cats should be able to do some damage to North Carolina.

Before picking Villanova to defeat Pittsburgh in the Elite Eight matchup, I mentioned that the Wildcats while small are very stout. They rebound on both glasses, make twos and prevent their opponents from making twos. These are traits that you’d expect from a much taller team than Jay Wright’s club, which doesn’t have a single player taller than 6-foot-8.

In that game against Pitt, there was great shock and awe at how Villanova was able to win the battle on the glass, namely in grabbing 43 percent of its misses, but the Cats have gotten on the offensive board all season. Only twice in Villanova’s last 13 games have the Cats not gotten at least 30 percent of their misses. Villanova has four players adept at hitting the offensive glass, with Dante Cunningham, Shane Clark, Dwayne Anderson and Antonio Pena all approximately equally able. Reggie Redding is also a good rebounding guard, but he does more of his work on the defensive glass.

North Carolina is the weakest defensive rebounding team at the Final Four, grabbing less than 32 percent of its misses. Hansbrough’s lack of length hurts him more on the defensive glass than on offense, though he is still the best defensive rebounder — a smidge better than Deon Thompson — among UNC’s starters. Because of Villanova’s aptitude in this area, we may see a little more Ed Davis on Saturday, as he is the team’s best rebounder, at least in terms of rate.

Where North Carolina can hurt Villanova: At the 3-point line. Most think that North Carolina will exploit Villanova inside, but it’s really on the perimeter where UNC’s offense has the greatest advantage. Among NCAA Tournament teams, only No. 16 seeds East Tennessee State and Chattanooga give up more 3-point attempts than Villanova, and that’s good news for North Carolina, who — at 38 percent — is the best 3-point shooting team in Detroit. The Cats allow a mediocre 33.2 percent opponents 3-point rate for the season.

Of course, North Carolina is loath to attempt 3-pointers, attempting more 3-pointers than just 10 of the other 64 NCAA Tournament teams — fellow Final Four teams Michigan State and UConn being two of those 10. With such terrific post play and a great penetrator in Tywon Lawson, it’s no surprise why UNC likes to keep things inside, but with their three most likely 3-point shooters — Lawson, Danny Green and Wayne Ellington — at 39.7 percent or better, the Tar Heels may want to test the waters from deep. As Duke found out in the Sweet 16, though, even with open looks, you better make them. The Blue Devils hit just 5-of-27 3-pointers in their 23-point defeat to Nova.

Irresistble force against immovable object: Villanova at the free-throw line. North Carolina isn’t really into fouling. The Tar Heels would rather make opponents earn its baskets, even if the rest of its defense isn’t so strong, knowing that their offense is very efficient — in that sense, UNC is sort of a very rich man’s Notre Dame. There’s no reason to slow the game down, risk foul trouble and give the opponent free shots, when the offense thrives on pushing the tempo and keeping the game moving.

Villanova, though, is 11th among the 65 NCAA teams in getting to the line and is 19th in the nation in free-throw percentage at 75.3 (North Carolina is 10th at 76.5). Nova’s two points guards, Scottie Reynolds and Corey Fisher get to the line often and hit at 81.7 and 78.8 percent once there. Cunningham is also a guy who draws fouls and hits at a comparatively mediocre but still solid 69.3 percent. I’m interested to see whether UNC will continue to prevent opponents from getting to the line and whether that will mean that Villanova is getting easy buckets or missing contested layuops.

Resistible force versus movable object: North Carolina at the free-throw line. It could and should be a surprise that the team with the player that has made more free throws than any player in college basketball history would be mediocre at getting to the foul line. In fact, North Carolina was just fifth in the ACC at getting to the line this season and has gotten to the line at a better-than-national-average rate just once in the NCAA Tournament — against Gonzaga (and barely).

UNC makes up for not getting to the line often by making almost every free throw once there (with two excellent free-throw shooting teams — Villanova, of course, made 22-of-23 free throws against Pitt last Saturday — the team with the lead late should be in a good position). Hansbrough hits at 85.8 percent, Green at 85.2, Lawson at 81.5 and Ellington at 77.8, but only Hansbrough and Lawson get to the line with any frequency.

For all of its positive traits, Villanova is not good at keeping opponents off the foul line, fouling more often than a team with a modest 21.5-percent forced-turnover rate should. Fisher and Clark are particularly likely to foul. More importantly, Cunningham is prone to foul as well, and Nova will need him on the floor most of the game. Expect him to stay off Hansbrough and on Thompson. Antonio Pena, less used late in the season, is the most foul prone Cat should he see much time off the bench.

Conclusion: North Carolina could have faced a tougher matchup in the Final Four — perhaps a longer team that could present more problems for Hansbrough — but Villanova doesn’t play small, and the Cats have the firepower and balance to compete with North Carolina. It won’t take a phenomenal shooting performance or an unlikely incident — severe foul trouble or an ejection for the Tar Heels — for Villanova to win, as some pundits have suggested. The Cats won 15 games against Big East opponents, including two wins over Pitt. They’ve also recently defeated UCLA and Duke in blowouts. They will not be intimidated by any opponent, and they’ll probably be just a few good plays and a couple fortunate bounces from playing on Monday night. A few Corey Stokes threes wouldn’t hurt either.