Busting Brackets
Fansided

Marquette Basketball: Golden Eagles add series with Kansas State

By Brian Foley

LAS VEGAS, NV - NOVEMBER 24: Dean Wade
LAS VEGAS, NV - NOVEMBER 24: Dean Wade /
facebooktwitterreddit

Marquette Basketball has built a very nice non-conference schedule thus far, and a reported home-and-home with K-State is just the latest matchup on tap.

Marquette head coach Steve Wojciechowski continues to push all the right buttons this offseason. After adding two talented transfers to his roster in April, Wojo has kicked off May with a home-and-home series with Kansas State, according to Fan Rag Sports’ Jon Rothstein.

The Golden Eagles will host the first matchup in the new Milwaukee Bucks arena on Dec. 1, with a return date in Manhattan, Kan. yet to be determined. Marquette is just 3-7 all-time against the Wildcats, including four straight losses. The two programs have not played each other since 1988.

More from Big East

Kansas State finished 25-12 (10-8) in Bruce Weber’s sixth season, and advanced to the Elite Eight last year with wins over Creighton, UMBC (coincidentally, both schools are also 2018-19 MU foes), and Kentucky. The Wildcats fell to Loyola (Chi.) in the regional finals.

Kansas State is currently slated to return every major contributor from last season, although lead guard Barry Brown is currently testing the NBA Draft waters. Brown led K-State with 34.7 minutes per game last year and was second with 15.9 points. He also added 3.2 assists and 1.8 steals.

With Brown in tow, the Wildcats could push Kansas for the Big 12 crown. Without him, Weber will have to shuffle his offense around do-it-all wing (and leading scorer) Dean Wade. The hyper-efficient Wade is probably Kansas State’s best player, but Brown assumes the bulk of the perimeter ball handling, scoring, and attacking to make life easier for the rest of the team (similar to Marquette’s Markus Howard and Sam Hauser, though to a lesser degree). If the 6-3 rising senior goes pro, guards Kamau Stokes and Cartier Diarra will be thrust into a bigger role.

Brown has until May 30 to either sign with an agent or return to college for his senior season.

The home-and-home series with the Wildcats is just the latest addition to Marquette’s 2018-19 schedule.

Here are the dates we know so far:

Marquette also has a reported home game against Buffalo, and will likely play a road Gavitt game against a Big Ten foe in November. If the Gavitt Game comes to fruition, it means Wojo has already added seven games against 2018 NCAA Tournament teams on top of the always-competitive Big East slate, and has begun building his 2019-20 schedule.

Expectations are as high as they have ever been in the Wojo era in Milwaukee, which is understandable.Marquette is currently ranked 32nd in Bart Torvik’s preseason projection system, and should receive AP Top 25 votes come this fall, which is no small feat for Marquette right now. MU has not been ranked in the AP Poll since week four of the 2013-14 campaign.

As Big East fans have discussed ad nauseum, almost all of upper-level talent is moving onto professional leagues this summer. That is, except for Marquette, who has two of the conference’s top returning players in Howard and Hauser.

Next: High expectations for Marquette in 2018-19

This tough non-conference schedule further signifies how Wojo feels about his squad going forward. These big matchups mean big stakes, but the rising Golden Eagles should be up for the challenge.

Home/Big East