Only Sweet 16 appearances will validate Willard

The Seton Hall Pirates had their best season since 2004 by winning a NCAA tournament game. They also have been consistently good in the last few years by making the tournament three years in a row, having three straight 20-win seasons and winning the Big East Tournament. This program finally has stability they have been searching for since 2004 when it comes to winning and keeping the same head coach.

Angel Delgado, Isaiah Whitehead, Desi Rodriguez, Khadeen Carrington and Ismael Sanogo have been celebrated for putting the program back to respectability and relevancy in the Big East instead of Seton Hall head coach Kevin Willard, who recruited these guys.

Willard has been around basketball his entire life to know coaches get blame and players get credit. He knew the deal from his father Ralph Willard, who coached Western Kentucky, Pittsburgh and Holy Cross. He gets it, but it does not make it any better to know he does not get any share of credit for getting the Hall back. He deserves it just for getting kids from New York to play for his program and winning with them. It’s hard to win at Seton Hall as George Blaney, Tommy Amaker, Louis Orr and the disgraced Bobby Gonzalez can attest.

Only way Willard will ever get credit from Seton Hall fans is if he takes Seton Hall to consistent Sweet 16 appearances. Fans are realistic to know Seton Hall will never ever contend for national championships, but making it to the Sweet 16 should be feasible for a program that is in a power conference. That’s the goal the program should have year in and year out, especially when programs like the Xavier Musketeers, Villanova Wildcats and Butler Bulldogs can go far in the tournament.

For some, Willard has to earn the fans’ trust. This season was supposed to be the year of high expectations such as winning the Big East and going far in the tournament. Seton Hall underachieved in the regular season by going 10-8 in Big East play despite having a 21-11 regular season. They atoned for it by winning a tournament game and giving the Kansas Jayhawks all they could handle in the second round until they took a 83-79 loss on Saturday.

That will get fans off Willard’s case for awhile, but it does not mean he is going to be a revered figure like P.J. Carlesimo, who provided Seton Hall glory years by having them in the tournament consistently and giving them a Final Four appearance, which included a national championship game appearance that had them losing to Michigan in overtime.

He will have to do more such as sustaining his success by continuing to recruit better and winning with different classes. He will have to get star players that will take the Hall to new level of success. He will have to get the Hall to the point of success where they can schedule elite programs in the nonconference schedule rather than get easy wins from less-heralded programs in New Jersey.

Overall, the eighth-year Seton Hall head coach has done a fine job. It took awhile for him to build this program back. He was going to have time to build it up after having nothing to work with when he replaced Gonzalez, who recruited bad guys that was banished by the university. He brought stability, and he got so much mileage out of his players. He hired assistant head coaches who knew how to recruit such as Dwayne “Tiny” Morton, Orlando Antigua and Fred Hill Jr., who played a role in recruiting guys respectively like Whitehead, Delgado and Myles Powell.

Most importantly, he has recruited players with good character. That should not be overlooked.

Willard has gotten better at his job as the years gone on. He knows when to push his players and when not to. He understands how to distribute minutes to his players.

Now, he still has to learn how to trust his underclassmen. He needs to develop them by giving them minutes while giving his upperclassmen playing time.

Next year will be a challenge for Willard. He won’t have Sanogo to provide energy. He will not have Delgado to provide bulk. He won’t get the clutch shooting anymore from Rodriguez and Carrington. He is losing to them to graduation, and his best player next year is Myles Powell, who is as streaky as Rodriguez is as in he is going to go through a hot stretch and cold stretch.

If he gets Seton Hall to the tournament next year, maybe he will get his due from Seton Hall fans. They are going to be hard-pressed to make it without a go-to guy and a rebounder.

That may silence his critics for another 15 minutes, but they need more from him.

He needs to get Seton Hall past the first weekend of the tournament consistently.