Villanova looks to end narrative and write new Sweet 16 chapter

It is the game that has been hanging over Villanova for an entire year.

Last season the Wildcats were overpowering in winning the Big East regular-season and tournament titles and earning a No. 1 seeding in the NCAA Tournament. It came to an abrupt and painful ending with a loss to North Carolina State in the Round of 32. Villanova had made the tournament for the fifth time in six years since reaching the 2009 Final Four but again had failed to reach the Sweet 16.

Now the Wildcats have another chance to end the run of disappointments. Second-seeded Villanova (30-5) will meet No. 7 Iowa (22-10) in a South Regional second-round game at 12:10 p.m. Sunday at Barclays Center.

“This game has been there since we first started practice this season, even before that . . . Now we’re here and able to answer that question,” Villanova’s Josh Hart said. “ . . . For others the result is how our season will be judged. For us, it’s about what we want to accomplish.”

Villanova is 3-5 in its last five NCAA Tournament games, and no one in the program is satisfied with the perception that the Wildcats have become a paper tiger of sorts, great only as long as the regular season lasts.

Coach Jay Wright initially worried that having this game hang over the season might untrack it. It hasn’t. “I was more concerned with it being a problem for them during the year,” he said, “because if we concentrated on that during the year, we’d never have gotten here, and that would have been more of a failure — to not even get here to play the game — than losing.”

With the moment of truth finally on them, the pressure has to be highest for senior point guard Ryan Arcidiacono and senior center Daniel Ochefu. They’ve been dogged by it the longest. But if Friday’s first-round win is any indicator, those ’Cats playing in their first tournament feel none of it.

Freshmen Mikal Bridges and Jalen Brunson totaled 22 points. “I want those guys to play free,” Wright said. “I want them to play confident.”

Iowa wasn’t the most confident, losing six of eight before Friday’s overtime win at the buzzer. “Going through that stretch might have shaken some teams,” said Adam Woodbury, who scored the game-winner. “We got through it.”

Getting through is what it’s all about for Villanova.

“All season we had to talk about it because everyone kept asking about it. We said, ‘If we ever get to that spot, we’re going to really have to answer to it,’ ” Wright said. “Now we’re here and we said, ‘Hey, we’ve done this before, and what’s the worst outcome? We lost. And it didn’t kill us. So let’s have fun and enjoy playing in this game.’ . . . They get it.”