Marquette finished final exams this week just in time to take out their frustrations from last week's loss to UW-Madison to crush the UMBC Retrievers. Marquette won 68-46. Crean's club was led by Dominic James' 17 points on 8-16 shooting. Jerel McNeal added 15 and newcomer Lazar Hayward tallied 13 points and seven rebounds in the winning effort.
The Golden Eagles shooting struggles continued to manifest themselves however. MU shot a pitiful 33% from the free throw line on 6 of 18 shooting. For the game MU shot 45.2% and made just under 29% beyond the arc.
Jerel McNeal shot a surprising 60% from 3-point range today. McNeal has struggled all year from that spot but made three of his five deep shots against UMBC. Even more encouraging, McNeal only turned the ball over once tonight. Dan Fitgerald also shot well from deep as he sank 2 of his 3 bombs.
MU outrebounded UMBC 38 to 27 and recorded an impressive 12 steals. Tom Crean was exceptionally pleased with the first half defensive effort as MU notched 37 deflections in the first frame. The Retrievers were held to only 14 points as MU led 36 to 14 at the break.
AP Recap
Boxscore
Rosiak sums it up well -- the good defense and lousy shooting continue.
Here's a thread on the post-game interviews over at MUScoop.
First-hand account of the game here.
Here's the Scout.com recap.
GoMarquette.com recaps the game as well.
At this point, and by reading Crean's comments in the J.Sentinel, it looks like we should be prepared to drop at least two-to-three games based on free throw shooting alone. It's abysmal. Never seen such poor shooting from the charity stripe in person. I was shocked they even hit six.
ReplyDeleteJames looks uninspired since Duke. I do think a lot is he seems to be playing too much time at the 2. Hopefully Crean has a master plan and the he picks it up as I expect him too once B.East comes around.
Hayward was great on the glass and chucked up another brick or two from the outside. Considering that was his area of expertise coming in, it's very surprising.
Ous continued his inconsistent play, missing a few shots he always drains. Solid minutes from Fitzgerald, although he got a foul on the opening tip...something only he could do I think.
Glas McNeal shot well outside, but that ugly shot of his just kills me at the game.
Crean had them burning up the floor in the first half and it showed. Second half, final 10 minutes, I just watched Crean get on the guys to pick it back up.
Hopefully pick up another three "easy" wins the next two weeks than the brutality of the B.East can begin.
Great post Gene. Not. Pestimistic. Anything good to say. How about the positives. GO MU!!! They played fine.
ReplyDeleteagain with the negativity. it gets old hearing supposed MU fans complain so much.
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