Marquette Basketball: 2020-21 season preview for the Golden Eagles

Season Outlook

While their has been immense pressure on Marquette to reach the NCAA tournament each of the past two seasons, it feels as if expectations have been reasonably tempered entering the 2020-21 campaign.

The roster certainly has enough talent to jockey for an NCAA tourney bid, and if things break right, it isn’t even that hard to see this group worm its way into the top half of the Big East and earn a single-digit seed come March (or April or May or whenever this tournament gets played).

However, there are just a few too many questions around the program to feel confident that this is an NCAA tournament squad. Is this finally the Marquette group that plays defense? How does Carton fit in? Will anyone lock down the starting spot on the wing? Are the freshmen for real? Can John stay out of foul trouble? And so on and so forth.

The pandemic obviously plays a part in the lessened scrutiny and diminished expectations. People are clearly dealing with bigger issues than who will be Marquette’s first guard off the bench this year. And because of the university’s pandemic-induced financial issues, it also does not feel as if Wojciechowski’s seat is particularly warm this year.

Perhaps his job was never at stake, but with Marquette looking to save money wherever possible, the university will almost certainly avoid paying two head coaches at once. The lack of fans in attendance also means the program can avoid the *ahem* feedback a frustrated fan base has given the coaching staff in the past, particularly towards the end of a disappointing 2019-20 campaign.

In the end, Marquette should be a competitive, if unspectacular, team this year. Expectations should be to at least remain in the NCAA tournament conversation into the final week of the season. Anything less than that will be a tad disappointing; anything more will be a pleasant surprise. That might not be where Marquette fans want to be as the program enters Year 7 with Steve Wojciechowski, but it is the reality.

This is a crucial foundation-building season in Milwaukee, with six underclassmen expected to play real minutes this year, and three more newcomers (one transfer and two high school recruits) joining the fray in 2021-22. That sounds like a group that could be a popular pick to break out next season. But as MU fans know all too well, planning too far into the future can be a tricky gambit with the tectonic plates constantly shifting underneath the college hoops landscape.

Let’s just sit back, stay safe, and enjoy the return of college basketball.