The 2008 – 09 team , led by senior Dante Cunningham , junior Scottie Reynolds and breakout sixth man Corey Fisher , streaked to a fourth-place finish in the Big East , and a double bye in the conference tournament . The third-seeded Wildcats overcame a double-digit halftime deficit to underdog American to avoid a first-round upset in the NCAA Tournament . The team then defeated sixth-seeded UCLA by twenty points to make the program 's fourth Sweet Sixteen in five years . In its Sweet Sixteen matchup against Duke , the Wildcats used timely perimeter defense to score a 23-point victory and a trip to the Elite Eight . In a back-and-forth Elite Eight game with then-conference rival Pitt , Reynolds came up big with a game-winning shot to put Villanova back in the Final Four for the first time since their national championship run in 1985 . Villanova then fell to North Carolina , the eventual champions , in the National Semifinals at Ford Field in Detroit , Michigan by a score of 83 – 69
conference tournament
2009 Big East Men's Basketball Tournament
Jay Wright (basketball)