LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Josh Hart also picked up two quick fouls against North Carolina State last year.
You may remember how that went.
It was a second-round NCAA Tournament game in Pittsburgh, and Hart — coming off Big East Tournament MVP honors a few days earlier — was limited to four minutes in the first half and just 21 minutes overall after picking up two fouls 26 seconds apart in the first 6½ minutes of the game.
Hart got back into the game physically but really never did mentally. He finished with just one basket and five points as 8-seed NC State stunned top-seeded Villanova.
“That game still haunts me,” Hart says now. “I still feel like if I didn’t get into foul trouble, we would have won that game. Every time I pick up two early fouls, I think about that game.”
And Hart, Villanova’s all-conference junior forward, does get into foul trouble quite a bit because he’s so aggressive on both ends.
It happened again Thursday night, and it was eerily similar to last year.
But this time Hart — a year older, a year smarter — made it a positive and turned what could have been a nightmare into one of the best games of his life.
The refs at the KFC Yum! Center were calling the game very close for both teams. And Hart, Villanova’s leading scorer, picked up two fouls even faster in the Sweet 16 game against Miami than he did against NC State.
The first came 2:14 into the game and the second just five seconds later.
Just like that, Mikal Bridges was in and Hart was out.
“You saw me walking to the bench,” he said later. “I was over there yelling at myself, yelling at everybody. I was frustrated.”
Coach Jay Wright immediately cornered Hart on the Villanova bench.
He knew this was a crucial moment for Villanova as it tried to reach the Elite 8 for the first time since 2009.
“Josh still says that he thinks about that game and he let everybody down,” Wright said. “And I’ve tried to talk to him a number of times about that, that it’s gone, that’s past, you’re a different player.
“When he came out of the game, I just said to him, ‘You’re going back in, I’m playing you with two, don’t worry about it.’ I think that really helped.
“He just wants to play and help the team, but he handled it really well.”
A year ago, when Hart picked up two quick fouls against North Carolina State, he never recovered and Villanova never recovered.
“Last year, I think he kind of went in the tank a little bit after not being able to play in the first half,” Ryan Arcidiacono said.
Hart has had a year to think about this, and he was determined not to let it happen again.
“I never really left the game,” he said. “I was in it mentally. I was cheering for those guys. I was there talking to those guys, cheering them on, trying to be as much as a leader as I could be on the bench.
“That’s why I was able to come back in and still be aggressive. Because I never really left that game.”
Hart went to the bench with 17:41 left in the first half with Villanova up five and came back in at 7:06, with Villanova up six.
After 10½ minutes on the bench, he looked as aggressive as ever.
In fact, Hart did something bordering on brilliant once he returned to the game.
Realizing first-hand that the refs were calling the game very close, he began attacking the rim and drawing fouls instead of picking them up.
Over the game’s final 27 minutes, he scored 14 points and added three assists and three rebounds, and the Wildcats won 92-69.
You want aggressive?
Hart was so focused on attacking the rim and drawing fouls that for the first time since the ninth game of his freshman year — 100 games ago — he didn’t attempt a single three.
“A little bit of it was how the refs were calling the game,” Hart said. “I got two quick ones so I was like, ‘You know what? They’re blowing the whistle, let’s push the issue and try to get some of those guys in foul trouble,’ and it worked out.
“Being aggressive was definitely the way to go there. Get those guys on the bench was where we wanted them.”
Thanks in large part to Hart's aggressiveness to the rim, Miami found itself riddled with foul trouble and in the bonus with 9:49 left in the second half.
Villanova is No. 2 in Division I in foul shooting, so once the Wildcats were in the bonus, Miami had no shot.
“That was just very smart, the way Josh played,” Wright said. “He saw that they were extending their defense on us well beyond the three-point line to take us out of running plays.
“When they do that, when you can’t run plays, you have to drive the ball. If he gets the ball and passes up that opportunity, we’re in trouble because he might not get it back. Every opportunity, he saw it and he drove and he either scored or got to the line.
“He was great. He was really important in that game.”