January 24th, 2016: Marquette at St. John's

Just the Facts, Ma'am: St. John's came back against Marquette in the second half behind a spirited press and hot three-point shooting, but it wasn't enough, as the Johnnies fell 78-73. Durand Johnson of St. John's led all scorers with 20 points off the bench, with Federico Mussini adding 19. Duane Wilson led Marquette with 17 points, while Henry Ellenson added 16 points, 18 rebounds, and four blocks.

For delays, resounding blocks, rim protection, strategic choices, fans sitting on their goddamn hands, bright colors, rude comments, and general strange thoughts, join your intrepid and slow blogger after the jump.


Since they're letting us stay, we figured we'd take in the men's game while we were at it. I always forget how much bigger men's basketball players are than women. Of course, Marquette might just look bigger because they're wearing such bright yellow shirts.

We'll see how loud it is appropriate for us to be; we're across from the opposing bench, after all, and there's a sextet of Marquette students in front of us, two of them wearing various flavors of retro Dwayne Wade jerseys.

Marquette, please don't break the clock. We don't have that many of them. (No, seriously, the Marquette men were doing their slam dunk line, and then suddenly the clock started spewing gibberish.)

Why is there a dude in a Syracuse shirt here? This isn't an ACC game!

At half, Marquette is up 31-23. St. John's has a lot of fight and a lot of heart, but we're hooked on three-pointers like a junkie on smack and we can't finish at the rim.

I want one of those basketball beanbag chairs. Finishing the game of musical chairs with a slam dunk? Boss.

I think we might have traumatized Akina a little bit. Most of the team is sitting by us, though Sandie has decided that her seat in section 10 is her seat, benches be damned, and Aaliyah seems to have found someone in section 11 (she's also wearing bright yellow, so maybe she's just practicing her camouflage). The upperclassmen have mostly left, leaving us with the freshmen and the sophomores. I think Jordan might have napped during halftime.

The dude in the Syracuse shirt doubled down- he had a Syracuse shirt under his shirt. How even are you still alive, dude?

The guys have a lot of potential, but they have got to work on their fundamentals. The ballhandling was awful, and too many shots right at the rim were missed. That can be coached. At least, I think that can be coached.

I find Marquette's blend of athletic guards and slabs of Midwestern beef interesting. They couldn't handle pressure well at all, and I'm sorry we didn't exploit that earlier.

Sacar Anim had a nice break in the first half, but didn't play much later in the game. Traci Carter attempted to play defense and was not strong at it. Matt Heldt made space in the middle- that was a theme with the bigs for Marquette, setting picks and boxing out. Wally Ellenson's primary job seemed to be confusing the daylights out of me (I didn't run up a custom score sheet for this, so I got lucky in both teams having names on their jerseys, but I was still 'what the hell, didn't Ellenson just come out of the game, wait, there are TWO of them, oh come on). Sandy Cohen III drove the lane hard and got rewarded for it often.

Duane Wilson reminded me a lot of Danaejah Grant- a solid shooter with driving ability who could rebound a little. He had a pretty good running mate in Haanif Cheatham, whose body control going to the basket reminded me very much of Aliyyah Handford. Luke Fischer was popular with the Marquette contingent in front of us- every time he made a good play, they would let out a "LUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!" Henry Ellenson was throwing up some really weird shots at the rim- I think he was trying to get around the shot-blockers- but he protected his own rim like a boss. No one was getting around him, no one was getting rebounds from him. Jajuan Johnson got most of his points off jumpers in the paint, though he was at the receiving end of a lot of shot-blocking pain.

Christian Jones had one monster putback that got the crowd going, but otherwise couldn't hit. Granted, he was shooting over taller defenders pretty much all of the time- dude's built, but for a post, I get the feeling he's not that tall. Durand Johnson heated up late in the second half from beyond the arc and really got the fans involved. I'm given to understand that this was an unusually good game for Malik Ellison, but I like his aggression on defense.

Felix Balamou got the start, but he didn't play much. I don't know if it's because his starting is a formality, or if he didn't fit Mullin's plan of "shoot threes and pray", or if something else is at play. I like his hair, though. Very noticeable. Federico Mussini is so tiny! The Marquette contingent in front of us was teasing him all night for his lack of height and width of frame. (I... may have shouted back that only insecure guys make fun of a guy's size, but I will neither confirm nor deny those assertions... but they stopped talking about his height after that.) He needs to work on his ballhandling- crossing one's self over is not a recommended course of action- but I like his speed and his shot. I seem to remember Ron Mvouika taking shots that did not seem to be in the game plan, but at this point it's Thursday and I might just be imagining things.

Amar Alibegovic was another popular target for the Marquette crew. Look, dude is never going to make a GQ cover, but calling him ugly just seems uncalled for. I like his toughness and his willingness to fight for his shot, but he's got to hit them. Kassoum Yakwe has great timing on blocks, but I don't know if he's worked on timing anything else. He seems more inclined towards the flashy Mutombo-style blocks than the smooshes that end up in the defense's hands. I think if he put a little more effort into his defense at the rim, and a little less into making his blocks as forceful as possible, he could be really tough down low. Plus he's got to finish. I know this is a thing with St. John's posts, but come on.

I think I understand why Mullin didn't go to the press immediately- they're short on players, and it is an energy-draining system. But it worked, and it works really well. What I liked was that everyone seemed to contribute to it, even the big men, which I'm not used to seeing from a pressing, trapping defense. (Well, except for Sue Wicks, but that was a long time ago in another land, or at least another island.)

Live by the three, die by the three. It's exciting and heady when they go in, but frustrating when they don't go down and the other team's off to the races on the break from the long rebound. I feel like we might better served teaching the big men some moves in the lane, but that's a long-term solution.

Refs are refs, refs gonna ref. The one really bad call I can remember was in the Red Storm's favor, a foul on Marquette that should have been a travel on St. John's.

We all know Lavin left the cupboard bare. We know there were an astounding number of academic issues to clean up in his wake. We know there are injuries and sundry other absences. It's still kinda rough watching them be so raw.