[Cracked Sidewalks] Commodores edge Warriors in Nashville

[CrackedSidewalksSays]

Commodores edge Warriors in Nashville

Written by: noreply@blogger.com (Tim Blair)

Another quality opponent, another soul-crushing loss.

Marquette continued its unenviable run of close losses to good teams tonight, falling 77-76 to 24th ranked Vanderbilt in Nashville.  The Warriors battled to take a 76-75 lead on Dwight Buycks' jumper with 19 seconds left but surrendered a bucket to the Commodores with 4.1 seconds remaining to set up the final sequence.  After an MU timeout Darius Johnson-Odom dribbled furiously up the floor, lost control and turned the ball over to end the game.

Surely Marquette leads the NCAA in last second shots not taken.

With the loss MU falls to 9-4 on the season and heads to Big East play with exactly zero quality out of conference wins.  The Warriors host West Virginia on New Year's Day.

Marquette shot an impressive 56% from the floor tonight and held the notable Commodore marksmen to just 26% from deep and 48% overall.  Yet MU was unable to create a turnover advantage, connected on only 7 of 13 free throws, and as has been the case all season the Warriors struggled to control the defensive glass in key spots.

MU was led by Jimmy Butler with 15 points.  Darius Johnson-Odom added 14, Buycks had 14, Chris Otule had a dozen while Vander Blue finished with 10 points.

Todd Rosiak blogs a recap.
Box Score.

http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/2010/12/commodores-edge-warriors-in-nashville.html