Thomas Healy ’28
Staff Writer
The Holy Cross men’s basketball team has endured a tough spell of league games these past two months. After stealing a promising win at American in mid-January, the team has only been able to squeeze out two wins since then. That placed the Crusaders at 4-10 in conference, tied for last place with Army entering Wednesday’s game against Lafayette.
It’s especially troublesome considering some of the wins the team came into conference play with, including at home against Northeastern and on the road at Fordham. Struggling to band together multiple wins in the Patriot League has been a recurring theme for third-year head coach Dave Paulsen. In the 2024-25 season, the team finished at 5-13 in the PL. In the 2023-24 season, the first year of Paulsen’s tenure, 6-12.
Through 47 Patriot League games, Paulsen’s teams have had to dig extremely deep for every win. Don’t get things twisted, the Patriot League is one of the most fluid, unpredictable leagues in the sport–every team has a chance to beat the other on any given night. Blowouts are rare and most games are decided within 10-15 points.
In these last two seasons, the Crusaders have faced hapless injuries that have hamstringed the team’s push for seeding in the Patriot League. Most recently, Junior guard Joe Nugent went down at Army on January 31st. His season looks to be over.
It’s no excuse either, as every single team in college basketball faces injuries late in the season. Some have rosters built to adapt, some do not. Success in basketball is measured as much in a team’s resiliency as in its level of talent.
For this year’s Holy Cross team, the talent and resilience is there–but it hasn’t translated into success. The losses have been hard-fought, won in the trenches type of games. They’re ones that make you go, “We could have had that one.”
If it were the other way around–if the losses weren’t scrappy and frequently decided at the 11th hour–then the outlook on the rest of the season would look very discouraging. However, the fact that this team is more than its 4-10 league record is why the next few weeks in college basketball have produced some of the best sports moments of the last 50 years.
The aura of Cinderella runs, upsets on the road, and a shot at the NCAA tournament is upon us.
The Patriot League tournament begins when us students are on spring break. It is single-elimination and Holy Cross will most likely be facing a high seed on their campus site. So, even if playoff basketball did return to the Hart Center, campus would be mostly empty.
There’s one more detail that compels me to overlook our current league record.
Ten years ago this March, the #9 seed Holy Cross Crusaders pulled off the most memorable run in program history. Faced with four away playoff games to win the Patriot League tournament, hopes of returning to the NCAA tournament looked meager.
Baltimore, Lewisburg, West Point, Bethlehem: Almost 800 miles traveled in a coach bus. That’s the trade-off for what was the program’s first NCAA tournament berth in nine years. They shocked the league and themselves.
2015-16 was shaping up to be another disappointing year for Holy Cross basketball. It took four games in March, and now that team has an asterisk next to it in the record books, deservedly so.
That historic team was honored at the Cousy Court dedication on February 7th, serving as an unceasing reminder that capitulation is futile.
There is no reason to accept defeat for this current Holy Cross team with regular season games remaining and the Patriot League Championship Tournament in sight.
The team plays at Bucknell this Sunday, February 22nd and Boston University, next Wednesday, February 25th, before returning to the Hart Center for Senior Day against Loyola on February 28th.
Featured image courtesy of the Worcester Telegram
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