Big East Conference
Basketball
Sixth Man of the Year
JOSH HART
ALL-MET ELITE
SIDWELL FRIENDS HS.
WASHINGTON D.C.
“It’s a testament to my parents and my teammates, the character they’re instilling in me and the confidence they have in me,” Hart said after practice. “Obviously, everyone wants to start, but there can only be five starters, so the confidence they have in me being the first guy off the bench is a testament to them, not just me.”
Villanova coach Jay Wright may disagree a little bit with that statement. He planned to start Hart and bring junior Dylan Ennis off the bench before Ennis went out and had a monster summer and fall, Wright said. Hart took the news in stride.
“It’s so unusual for a kid of that age, as a sophomore, to be so mature and turn it into such a positive,” Wright said. “To win the Sixth Man of the Year award and really have a great year, a better year that he did as a freshmen when he was probably expecting to start, too. It’s really impressive and it really speaks to his character.”
“Everybody wants to start,” Hart said. “Everybody wants to play 30-40 minutes a game, but realistically, that’s not going to happen. So having the confidence that this team and this coaching staff gives me every day in practice helps me to go out there with a clear mind to do whatever I can do to help this team win.”
What Hart brings most of all is energy, especially on defense. His natural aggressive nature along with tremendous athletic ability makes him a solid defender and a great weak-side rebounder. He also spent the offseason working on his shot with associate head coach Baker Dunleavy and it has paid off.
Hart went from a player who averaged 7.8 points, 4.4 rebounds per game while shooting 31 percent from 3-point range to one of the most deadly shooters from deep in the Big East Conference. He leads the team and is second in the conference in 3-point field goal percentage (44.2) and is second on the team and ninth overall in overall field goal percentage (48.5). He’s also fifth on the team in minutes per game (25.4) and scoring (9.7) and third in rebounding (4.4).
“It actually worked out where he’s the better sixth man,” Wright said. “He can play any position, except probably point guard. He’s tough enough (that) if we had to play him at the five we could and that’s the beauty of putting him in there.
“We kind of look and see what we need. Do we need to get bigger? We take out one of the guards. Do we need to get quicker? We take out one of the forwards. You put him in at any one of those spots and he brings energy immediately no matter what spot he plays. He brings aggressiveness on defense and an ability to hit threes. That’s the best sixth man. You can’t get much better than that.”
