The Big East is hard. Almost everyone can defend their home court, half the conference is in contention for an at-large bid, and the other half is positioned to play spoiler (except for Georgetown). You can fight through all of that to win 90% of your games and be rewarded with a tie at the top of the standings. It’s rough.
It just got rougher for Xavier, who has gone 2-2 in their last 4, as news has broken that Zach Freemantle is out for a month. A team that relies on offense and their top five has lost one of those top five and its second leading scorer.