With an experienced Villanova point guard injured, freshman Acaden Lewis might get the keys right away

Kevin Willard doesn’t have a lot of experience giving a freshman point guard the keys from the start. Certainly not in recent memory.

College basketball has become an old man’s game. The transfer portal and a payment structure has made it easier to acquire older, experienced talent and not have to rely on freshmen if you don’t need to.

Willard’s roster rebuild … err, restart at Villanova saw many comings and goings, but a versatile and young backcourt had the steady hands of 23-year-old Devin Askew, a Long Beach State transfer at his fifth school in six years. Everything was going to be new, but Askew at least brought experience handling the ball.

But Askew is dealing with a knee injury and does not have a firm timetable to join the Wildcats, who begin the Willard era with their first game on Nov. 3 vs. Brigham Young in Las Vegas. For now, expect to see the ball frequently in the hands of freshman Acaden Lewis, a consensus top 35 prospect, which means this will all take some getting used to for Willard.

“If I had hair I wouldn’t have hair at the end of preseason,” Willard joked Wednesday.

Willard said Lewis and fellow freshman Chris Jeffrey, who also figures to be in the rotation, are getting used to playing with other good players and finding their way in the lead-up to their first college season.

“They’re freshmen,” Willard said, “and you’re going to have to live with a little bit of ‘What are you doing?’”

Lewis, a crafty lefty, is already learning how different things are and will be.

“I’m really flashy,” he said. “I make a lot of home-run plays. Here, it’s more encouraged sometimes to hit singles and then hit the home run plays when needed.”

While Askew has been out, Willard noted that the graduate student has taken Lewis under his wing.

“He’s a really good player,” Askew said. “It makes my job easy because all I have to do is give him little tips here and there.”

Especially when Lewis is going for home runs.

“He’s been somewhat of a role model, always encouraging me,” Lewis said of Askew. “When I don’t make the single or go for the home run play and it doesn’t go in, there’s Willard cussing me out and there’s Dev like, ‘Do it again.’”

» READ MORE: Villanova basketball: Acaden Lewis’ court vision, Bryce Lindsay’s versatility stand out in open practice

Lewis, who originally committed to Kentucky over Duke and Connecticut, is older for his class and will turn 20 later this month. Does that give him an edge?

“It’s experience,” Willard said. “You can be old, but if you don’t have experience, what’s the point? I’m going to have to be patient. He’s already grown so much from the first practice, it’s just there’s something different when you’re going against a 23-year-old that’s a senior. It doesn’t matter that you’re a 20-year-old playing your first game. It’s just different.”

Willard said Askew’s injury will likely make the style of play Villanova rolls out different. He wanted to play fast, and an older, experienced ballhandler would’ve allowed for that tempo right away. But with younger players handling the ball, Willard said the offense will probably start out a tick slower than he wants.

“With freshman guards, you just got to make sure you play at a tempo that makes sure you can give them the best ways to make the best decisions,” Willard said.

Junior guard Tyler Perkins, one of two returning players for the Wildcats, said Lewis is “one of the most talented players I’ve ever played with.” Lewis’ passion and toughness have been the most surprising, Perkins said. If Lewis has a bad shooting performance practice, Perkins said he’s in the gym later getting extra work in. Perkins also noted that Lewis has a “professionalism” about him and is always one of the first people shaking hands with visitors at practice.

“He knows, obviously, he has a lot of hype around him and stuff, but he doesn’t let that get to his head,” Perkins said. “He’s a worker.”

» READ MORE: Kevin Willard’s Maryland exit still follows him, but the Villanova coach moved on and has high expectations

Lewis said he’s working most on taking care of the ball and being efficient. The biggest adjustment so far has been on defense, where he’s trying to improve his ability to fight through screens against physically stronger players than he’s used to. His flashiness, he said, born of playing outside and coming up as a youth basketball player in his native Washington, is probably not going to go away.

“It’s a little bit of a swag I have,” Lewis said. “You just got to find the middle ground where it’s still swaggy but also efficient and gets me to the level where I want to be at.”

But Lewis also said he’s used to working his way up and is treating his first college season as a “restart.”

“I wasn’t always the best, so I didn’t always get the ball as much,” he said. “I didn’t always get to be the point guard and handle the ball. I’m used to having to work my way up, and as good as I was in high school and middle school and all that, now we’re here and I have nothing. I haven’t proven anything, I’m not one of the big guys on draft boards.”

He’s going to shoulder a heavy load, however, and right away. Villanova is deep but there are a lot of moving parts, and Willard’s rotations, while versatile, will take some time to figure out. Which guard combinations play best together? Which small-ball lineups are most effective? Can the lineups with a 7-footer (Braden Pierce) next to the 6-10 guy (Duke Brennan) work? Lewis will have his share of shooters to distribute to — like James Madison transfer Bryce Lindsay, Perkins, and redshirt freshman Matthew Hodge, among others (and including taking his own shots) — but he’s likely to be at the center of it all.

What gives him the confidence he can step right in and be the lead guard on a Big East team?

“I have to keep my head up,” Lewis said. “That’s the No. 1 thing I think you can do as a freshman, just keep your head up. You’re going to make bad plays. You’re going to take bad shots. That’s just normal. Throughout my whole career, God willing I’m in the NBA or whatever goes on, I’m going to shoot bad shots. I’m going to make some dumb turnovers. I’m going to have games where I’m just completely out of it.

“I think the best thing you can do is keep your head up and keep going, and be a good teammate. When I’m not having my day I try to pour into others. That’s the best part about being a point guard. You can be terrible. You can be 1-for-10 with three turnovers, but as long as you’re clapping your teammates up, getting them involved, you always have a chance to win the game.”

The real games don’t start for another month, but sounding the part at this point has to count for something.

“He’s got confidence in himself,” Askew said of Lewis. “That’s what you need to be a great player. He’s got that.”