MU Women's Basketball Thread

[Spaniel with a Short Tail]

Was surprised neither announcer apparently knew about Three Goggles yesterday.

[Marquette Fan]

Saw DePaul lost again. Given their Wojoesque late season collapse will they still make the tourney?

I don't think so but Charlie Creme of ESPN still has them in as an 11 seed with today's update and has them as one of the last 4 in.  But they have a NET of 71 and an absolutely awful loss to Butler at home and the Creighton loss at home isn't the greatest either.  And losing in their first BET game did not help them at all.  It may depend on how much the committee values DePaul's win over Kentucky and if they want to take a 3rd team from the Big East.  Seton Hall had an outside shot at dancing instead of DePaul in my opiniono had they been able to beat Marquette today.  But Seton Hall got upset by Creighton so they won't even play Marquette in the tourney of course.  If DePaul doesn't go dancing, it would be the first time since 2002 that they haven't made the NCAA Tournament.

Marquette has a NET of 31 as of this morning and is holding steady at a predicted 8 seed in the ESPN bracketology.  They were only a 10 seed on another prediction site I saw.  Although I prefer a 10 seed to an 8 seed to avoid a #1 seed in the 2nd round.  The 1 seeds are often a lot stronger than the 2 seeds in the women's tourney.  At least this season there's no concern with playing the 1 seed on their home court this year though with the bubble happening in San Antonio.

[Marquette Fan]

Was surprised neither announcer apparently knew about Three Goggles yesterday.

Yeah that was weird that neither one knew what that was. 

Different announcers today by the way...

[Billy Hoyle]

Was surprised neither announcer apparently knew about Three Goggles yesterday.

Are those allowed anymore?

[Spaniel with a Short Tail]

Are those allowed anymore?

Careful...

[Marquette Fan]

Marquette is only up by 4 at the half.  Come on Marquette - pull away in the 2nd half...

[Marquette Fan]

7P Central tonight on FS1 - MU vs. UCONN in the BET finals.  It's the 5th straight season Marquette has made the BET finals.

[MU82]

I'm glad UConn is back in the Big East ... though I think I'll be a little less glad tonight!

[MU Fan in Connecticut]

New Haven Register Preview

[Marquette Fan]

Here we go - BET Final on FS1.

[Spaniel with a Short Tail]

[MU24]

ooooof. Not a great year for MU basketball programs.

[wadesworld]

ooooof. Not a great year for MU basketball programs.

Until UCONN/Geno are out of the BE again, I don’t think it’s going to get any better than this season for MUWBB.

[Warriors4ever]

MU24, the women were second in the Big East to UConn and made it to the championship game of the conference tourney, and they’re heading to the NCAA. You don’t think that was a good season?

[MU82]

ooooof. Not a great year for MU basketball programs.

What? MU’s women’s team has had a heck of a season ... and it isn’t over yet.

[JWags85]

What? MU’s women’s team has had a heck of a season ... and it isn’t over yet.

UCONN won EVERY Big East game by over 20 points including the tournament...except for their last regular season game against MU, at Gampel no less. This is an ABSURD UCONN team. In any other season up till now, MU would have been the class of the BEast.

[Billy Hoyle]

UCONN won EVERY Big East game by over 20 points including the tournament...except for their last regular season game against MU.
, at Gampel no less. This is an ABSURD UCONN team. In any other season up till now, MU would have been the class of the BEast.

Everybody else in the BE is playing for second every year. We got that. That’s a successful season.

[JWags85]

Everybody else in the BE is playing for second every year. We got that. That’s a successful season.

Oh absolutely, my point was more that MU had a great season and UCONN’s insane dominance had no real negative bearing on that.  Marquette’s performance on the road in Storrs was tremendous all things considered.

 Muffet McGraw is an amazing HOF coach who put together a tremendous program that is the envy of most every WBB program...and she won the BEast Conference outright twice in 20 years in a conference with Geno and UCONN, and he still managed to circle the wagons and make FF each of those years and win a title in one too.  That’s how ridiculous and consistent that program is.

Point being, if you’re gonna use losing to UCONN as an excuse for a season being a disappointment, you have no perspective and need to move along.

[tower912]

ooooof. Not a great year for MU basketball programs.

Somebody showed up to display their lack of understanding.

[MU82]

Listen to all you slurpers settling for mediocrity.

Losing to UConn is inexcusable!

Until Marquette’s better than UConn, our program is a failure.

[Marquette Fan]

ooooof. Not a great year for MU basketball programs.

Wow - not sure what you would consider successful then.  If they can win their first NCAA Tournament game, they will reach 20 wins yet again.  And that’s with less games than usual played this season with a lot less non conference games and missing two conference games due to opponent covid issues (both those games would have been likely wins for MU too).  They were picked to finish 3rd in the BE and finished 2nd.  Nobody outside the MU program expected them to win last night.  They are just outside the top 25 too.

Finally I bet a number of other P5 schools who will likely be interested in Duffy soon would look at this as a very successful season for MU.

[shoothoops]

Oh absolutely, my point was more that MU had a great season and UCONN’s insane dominance had no real negative bearing on that.  Marquette’s performance on the road in Storrs was tremendous all things considered.

 Muffet McGraw is an amazing HOF coach who put together a tremendous program that is the envy of most every WBB program...and she won the BEast Conference outright twice in 20 years in a conference with Geno and UCONN, and he still managed to circle the wagons and make FF each of those years and win a title in one too.  That’s how ridiculous and consistent that program is.

Point being, if you’re gonna use losing to UCONN as an excuse for a season being a disappointment, you have no perspective and need to move along.

McGraw was a great HOF coach. But her results with and without Niele Ivey as both a player and a coach are a bit different. (They won 8 straight league titles in Big East Nd ACC leagues w/Ivey on staff, NCAA Championship, 3 other Final Final Fours, and they won National Titles with her as a player and coach etc..)  Without Ivey, McGraw's best NCAA result was a Sweet 16. They were a great tandom, but can't really say one without the other.

As for Marquette, the Women had a good season. One loss, even a bad loss doesn't define a season. Duffy has done well early at Marquette to maintain an NCAA level team. Hopefully she can recruit, improve the seeding, be more competitive with some of the elite, higher level teams in the future, as a regular top 25 team.

The approach isn't to run away from an elite program. It's to find ways to keep getting better and be more competitive with the better and best teams. MUWBB was able to play more competitive in one of the three games. That's a start.

For now, and in the near future, keep producing NCAA level teams, keep trying to improve. Keep improving results while there too. Those would be good results.

[Macallan 18]

Will/Does the loss hurt MU's seeding? Or will it depend on what happens with the other tournaments this week?

Would be great to avoid the 8/9 seed!

[JWags85]

McGraw was a great HOF coach. But her results with and without Niele Ivey as both a player and a coach are a bit different. (They won 8 straight league titles in Big East Nd ACC leagues w/Ivey on staff, NCAA Championship, 3 other Final Final Fours, and they won National Titles with her as a player and coach etc..)  Without Ivey, McGraw's best NCAA result was a Sweet 16. They were a great tandom, but can't really say one without the other.

I know your colored glasses with everything STL, but come on.  You’re giving a freshman who played in 5 games credit for ND’s Final Four run that year?  And that she was the pivotal reason for the title and not Ruth Riley who won basically every award possibly that championship season as well as being the BE DPOY every year?  That’s like saying Crean didn’t win anything until Diener came along.

Everything about Ivey as a coach is spot on however.  She clearly made a massive impact, in addition to the help of the ACC move,  there’s a reason she got the big chair.

[shoothoops]

I know your colored glasses with everything STL, but come on.  You’re giving a freshman who played in 5 games credit for ND’s Final Four run that year?  And that she was the pivotal reason for the title and not Ruth Riley who won basically every award possibly that championship season as well as being the BE DPOY every year?  That’s like saying Crean didn’t win anything until Diener came along.

Everything about Ivey as a coach is spot on however.  She clearly made a massive impact, in addition to the help of the ACC move,  there’s a reason she got the big chair.

Don't strain yourself trying to pick one season out of 33 while ignoring decades. I stated the record, the facts. And then I expanded upon them. Because you follow Women's basketball so closely, I know you are aware Ivey had a knee injury in November of 1996. (she had a few over the years) And because you aren't disingenous, I know you aren't trying to prop up 1 season out of 33, as if somehow that makes the point any different. And you forgot one small little thing about Ivey's playing career.

McGraw won 2 National Titles in 33 years at Notre Dame. The first came with Ivey playing as the star point guard. Ivey set the school record for assists in a season. She averaged 17 points and 6 steals a game in the 2001 Final Four helping Notre Dame secure McGraw's first National Title. She finished in the top 10 in 16 different statistical categories while a player at Notre Dame. Seems decent.

The 2nd McGraw National Title came with Ivey as a coach, recruiting many of the players and developing many of the guards and wings.

And of course came all of the other years of higher levels of success, Final Fours, league titles, producing many pro players, with Ivey at ND as opposed to when she wasn't.

Ivey was then hired by Taylor Jenkins of the Memphis Grizzlies to work with Ja Morant. Morant was later named NBA Rookie of The Year after that season.

And of course, it counts for McGraw that she recruited Ivey as both a player and a coach, as well as making many contributions of her own to their success in a variety of areas. McGraw was successful on her own. But, much of ND's higher levels of success to this point have been McGraw and Ivey, Ivey and McGraw which of course was and still is the point, which hasn't changed. It counts for both.

Hopefully Duffy can keep Marquette in the top 25-30 mix and build upon it moving forward. That would be good results for her and MUWBB.