Villanova fires coach Kyle Neptune after 3 years and no NCAA Tournament appearances, AP source says

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Villanova fired Kyle Neptune after a three-year run where he succeeded Hall of Fame coach Jay Wright and failed to ever make the NCAA Tournament, a person familiar with the decision told The Associated Press on Saturday.

The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because the firing was not yet announced.

Neptune went 54-47 overall in three seasons with the Wildcats, including a 19-14 record this season. The Wildcats — who won two national championships under Wright — lost to UConn on Thursday night in a Big East Conference Tournament quarterfinal at Madison Square Garden.

It was the first major decision made by Eric Roedl, a Villanova alumnus hired earlier this season as the new athletic director.

Neptune felt the heat this season as the Wildcats — once a perennial Big East winner and national title contender — slid into mediocrity and out of national prominence. Not even regular-season wins over St. John’s and UConn could offset the overall lack of consistency in a season that also included losses to Columbia and Saint Joseph’s.

The 40-year-old Neptune served under Wright on the Villanova coaching staff before accepting the head coaching position at Fordham in 2021. Neptune went 16-16 in his lone season at Fordham.

Wright, who was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2021, guided Villanova to titles in 2016 and 2018 and led the Wildcats to two other Final Four appearances. He went 520-197 in 21 seasons at the school and has remained a steady presence at Villanova games. Wright now works for CBS.

The Wildcats will miss the NCAA Tournament for a third straight season for the first time since Wright’s first three seasons more than 20 years ago. Wright was given the grace period Neptune was not in large part because this was no rebuild on the Main Line — the program boasted healthy NIL coffers and had the nation’s leading scorer this season in Eric Dixon.

Villanova could still play in the new College Basketball Crown tournament later this month in Las Vegas.

The program that once anchored its success on the Villanova Way — a mini-dynasty built on NBA-ready upperclassmen — has become discombobulated under the roster chaos born of NIL money and the transfer portal. The yearly roster turnover has done little to build the culture — where senior stars once taught the new kids the concept of Villanova basketball — that was once a championship hallmark under Wright.

Well-liked and respected by all in the program, Neptune had downplayed criticism throughout his tenure, insisting over the last two seasons as fan unrest grew around the tony Main Line campus he didn’t hear fans who booed him at times during pregame introductions or the horde that chanted “Fire Neptune!”

Wright floored Villanova when he retired at 60 years old weeks after leading the Wildcats to a Final Four in 2022. Neptune was hired the same month.

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UConn head coach Dan Hurley, right, hugs Villanova head coach Kyle Neptune after an NCAA college basketball game at the Big East basketball tournament Thursday, March 13, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Wednesday revived a Republican challenge to a law that allows the counting of late-arriving mail ballots, a target of President Donald Trump.

The high court majority ruled that candidates can sue over voting-counting rules, even if they haven't shown a clear effect on the outcome of the race.

“Win or lose, candidates suffer when the process departs from the law,” Chief Justice John Roberts. The court didn't rule on late-arriving mail-in ballots themselves, but will hear hear another case on the the broader issue this spring.

Requiring candidates to show that a rule could affect the outcome before challenging its legality risks court entanglement in elections during the high-pressure late stages of the process, Roberts wrote.

The court ruled 7-2 in favor of Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., and two other candidates. Two justices in the majority, Amy Coney Barrett and Elena Kagan, said they would have allowed Boast to sue but not any candidate for office.

“I cannot join the Court’s creation of a bespoke standing rule for candidates. Elections are important, but so are many things in life,” Barrett wrote.

Two others, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and Justice Sonia Sotomayor, dissented, saying allowing any candidate to sue would “opens the floodgates to exactly the type of troubling election-related litigation the Court purportedly wants to avoid.”

Bost appealed after lower courts tossed out his suit, ruling he lacked legal standing because any ballots that arrived after election day had little impact on his lopsided win.

The state had argued that allowing the lawsuit would “cause chaos” with increased election litigation. Bost, on the the other hand, said vote-total considerations shouldn’t affect his ability to come to court.

The Illinois law allows ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted if they are received up to two weeks later. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia accept mailed ballots received after Election Day as long they are postmarked on or before that date, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The Trump administration weighed in to support Bost. The Republican president has asserted that late-arriving ballots and drawn-out electoral counts undermine confidence in elections.

Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

The Supreme Court is seen during oral arguments over state laws barring transgender girls and women from playing on school athletic teams, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)