BT,

I do not understand your claim that these two teams have been going in opposite directions for the past few years. Two years ago villanova compiled a record of 6-8 which was an obvious dissapointment. Last year however, the wildcats rebounded and finished off with an 8-6 record including their first ever win over upenn and a victory over lehigh who were last years patriot league champs (bush league champs). That year included tough losses to top twenty and top ten teams such as georgetown, hopkins, notre dame, penn state and bucknell.
Fairfield is obviously improving, especially in the last few years, but they have absolutely no advantage over 'nova as of now. These so called "championships" which they have won are in no way legit mainly b/c of the teams involved in this conference: manhattan, siena, st. joes, quinnipiac, canisius and providence. These teams are at the bottom of the barrel, so coming out as the champion of a conference like that is not exactly a great accomplishment which you seem to be making it out as.
One fact that hurts your claim the most is that villanova was victorious over fairfield this year after a tough loss to the stags last year. To anyone, this would seem that villanova is improving while fairfied is doing just the opposite.
BT, im not trying to knock fairfield's program in any way, and i wouldnt be surprised within the next few years if fairfield becomes the dominant team being that they have 9 scholoarships to villanova's none. But at this point, villanova is in no way declining in its quality of play and are clearly a better team than the stags at this point. Fairfield has improved, but are not yet at the level where everyone expected them to be. I'm looking forward to yet another battle next spring.
-Out