Marquette Basketball: Golden Eagles back on pace when it matters

Xavier (13-13) wanted to break .500 and snap their 3-game losing streak. This entire season has been filled with close games for the Musketeers.

Looking at their entire season, they have scored 1968 points compared to their opponents, who have scored 1904, averaging less than a 3-point differential. Marquette, at 19-6, continues their battle to return to the top 5 in rankings. They’ve done incredible at home and have a full house of Marquette Men’s basketball legends with the 1974 Final Four members being honored at Sunday’s game. 

Xavier started the game doing a fantastic job at spreading the rock, with quick ball movements showing how deep their roster of efficient scorers is. Both teams showed a huge focus on defense, Xavier seemingly stopping everything the Golden Eagles tried but Marquette quickly found a way to break Xavier's front. With 11 minutes to go in the first half, Marquette went on an 8-2 run to take the lead 20-18, Jones with the majority of the Golden Eagles' points at 12. Smart's defense showed their tenacity with the full-court press early in the game after taking momentum to maintain control.

A brief scoring drought settled the crowd early on, with Xavier shutting down Marquette once again. Still, they were unable to capitalize on any of their turnovers leading to a similar score of 22-18 with only 7 minutes left in the first half. Joplin finally ended the drought on the court with a deep three from Mitchell, and Marquette continued to move the ball around, continuing to not settle for a bad shot, no matter how long it took, dominating time of possession. An alley-oop by Gold from Kolek got the crowd back on their feet, and consecutive threes from the golden eagles kept them up. You could feel the energy leave Xavier’s bench, with Marquette ending the half and extending their lead to 10.   

Marquette worked inside-out to start the second half, while Xavier showed a more controlled pace. Even with the adjustments at half and better shot selection, the Musketeers seemed to be at a loss with any idea of what to do against Shaka’s well-oiled machine. After a brief stretch of back-and-forth buckets from both teams, Xavier started to slow down and did their best to stay in the game, but Marquette was seemingly doing whatever they wanted on offense. Just when the game seemed to be running away from them, Trey Green answered with a contested three to keep the Musketeers’ hopes alive. Unfortunately, it was too little too late for Xavier. Marquette's second team came in to seal the deal.    

Marquette showed yet another team how effective their 6th man was in the stands, as they defeated the Musketeers 88-64. They effortlessly controlled the pace of the game on both sides of the ball and came away with another commanding win. This marks the second game in a row in which Marquette has won by 20+ points.

The Golden Eagles continue to show the nation why they deserve to be atop the Big East. Kam Jones had an explosive night, as you would expect for the birthday boy. He had almost half of the team’s points, finishing with 28.