"My rule was I wouldn't recruit a kid if he had grass in front of his house.
That's not my world. My world was a cracked sidewalk." —Al McGuire

Thursday, January 03, 2008

Showing no mercy, MU blows out Providence

UPDATED

Marquette used a decisive 22-5 run to open the second half and blow out the Providence Friars 96 - 67 in the Big East opener for both teams. Dominic James led MU with 21 points, including nine in the key second half barrage. With the win, Marquette moves to 11-1 on the season and is riding a seven game win streak.

James and Ousmane Barro keyed MU's play in the first half as the Golden Eagles built a 41-32 lead at the break. MU was slow out of the gate as the Friars raced to a fast 7-0 lead but James keyed a dominant MU response -- an 18-2 run. The Friars battled back with a 14-2 run of their own to lead 23-20 before MU poured it on late to close the half with a nine point advantage.

Lazar Hayward was impressive again with 17 points followed by Wesley Matthews with 16 and Ousmane Barro's season-high 14 points and 9 boards. MU connected on 53% of its shots and was 22-25 from the charity stripe --very efficient and impressive. MU also out rebounded PC 34-22.

This was a dominant performance.

Tonight's Big East opener marked the first of four games in 10 days for the Golden Eagles. MU will travel to Morgantown on Sunday to take on West Virginia before returning home next week for games against Seton Hall and Notre Dame. West Virginia lost at Notre Dame tonight, 69-56.

Pix
Pictures from Hilltopper's seat

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just a note that MU's next game is Sunday at WVU, not Saturday.

Anonymous said...

James was incredible tonight, controling the game, hitting the big shot, and pressure on defense. McNeil way off his game. Acker was awful in the 1st half, and great in the 2nd. Nice stroke from 3.

Anonymous said...

How can you say McNeil was way off? He had 9 assists and still pulled downs some boards and got some steals.

They started a bit too fast but calmed down nicely after the time out early.

I am liking this team a bit too much and have started to worry about the strength of our confrence schedule.

Anonymous said...

"I am liking this team a bit too much and have started to worry about the strength of our confrence schedule."

You mean you think it is to hard and we will lose games or you think it is too easy (some could say due to conference injuries) and we won't get a good enoug seed?

If you think the latter you are nuts. If you think the former you are also nuts.

This team is showing that it can be truly a top rate contender in any league, barring multiple injuries or other strife we should go very far. Enjoy this year and hopefully I will not be eating crow soon....

Anonymous said...

I was referring to the later. We have the potential of meeting far fewer unranked teams in our conference and will likely drop seeding

Anonymous said...

sorry, I ment fewer ranked