[Cracked Sidewalks] Warriors top Bearcats in Overtime Thriller

[CrackedSidewalksSays]

Warriors top Bearcats in Overtime Thriller

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

In a Champagne Special the Marquette Warriors topped the Cincinnati Bearcats in a battle of bubble teams, 79-76 in overtime.

Jimmy Butler and Darius Johnson-Odom led MU with 20 points each.  Butler delivered the coup de grace in overtime with the basketball equivalent of "hey look, your shoe is untied!" as he broke free for a three-quarter court pass and dunk on a routine in-bounds play with 15 seconds remaining.

True to form the resilient Lazar Hayward was credited with the assist on the Butler dunk.  The senior struggled for the first 39 minutes of this afternoon's game, missing 9 of his first 10 field goal attempts before connecting on a long three-pointer with 27 seconds remaining in regulation to force overtime.  In overtime Hayward dominated scoring 5 points, grabbing two rebounds and handing out the game's key assist.

Hayward finished with another double-double, 13 points and 11 boards.  Joseph Fulce played out of his mind, matching his career-high of 13 points to go with five boards in just 15 minutes of action.

With the win Marquette moves to 17-9 for the season and 8-6 in BIG EAST play.  With four games remaining on the regular season schedule, Buzz Williams' team remains on an improbable path to the NCAA tournament.  Winners of five of their last six, the Warriors will look to extend the recent hot streak with road games against resurgent St. Johns and talented Seton Hall this week.

The sublime Brad Galli recaps the win for MUTV ... by the way, Galli runs circles around the unprepared lightweights that ESPN Regional Television saddled viewers with this afternoon.

http://www.youtube.com/v/64HvKLIbWhE&hl=en_US&fs=1&

Box Score

By the way, are there any other Marquette fans who want to thank Mick Cronin for refusing to play the dominant Yancy Gates for more than 22 minutes?  MU had no answer for the Bearcats' big man -- so thanks, Mick.

http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/2010/02/warriors-top-bearcats-in-overtime.html

[HoopsMalone]

MU did have no answer for Cincy's big man, but at the same time, he could not cover Jimmy.  Jimmy did a great job getting around their bigs and getting fouled.  He is such a mismatch for opposing bigs and it worked out today.  Cincy's strategy was not as bad of a strategy as people are making it out to be. 

If I were Cronin I would have traded baskets with Gates and Butler for a little while though, because there was literally nothing Marquette could do against Gates either.

[NYWarrior]

If I were Cronin I would have traded baskets with Gates and Butler for a little while though, because there was literally nothing Marquette could do against Gates either.

Zactly.....He was dominant and as the nitwit announcers said, their offense was much better with him in the game.,

[ChicosBailBonds]

Hard to argue with their conclusions. 

http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/AB/20100221/COL03/302210015/

[PuertoRicanNightmare]

Sounds like a discipline situation to me. If so, kudos to Cronin for not kowtowing to talented attitude problems.

[mviale]

UC probably has more talent than Pitt, but chemistry is a problem.

[79Warrior]

UC probably has more talent than Pitt, but chemistry is a problem.

No way.

[Blackhat]

I think mviale's statement is accurate.

Cincy is loaded with raw talent and great measurables.   They play dumb as h... basketball though.