G-Town - Marquette Game

[gtown100]

Not knowing much about your team, other than Dominic James, I was curious how you thought the teams matched up along with a little preview of our Hoya squad.

First off, it should be an amazing atmosphere at the Verizon Center on Saturday (which hasn't been the case in previous years).  It is a sell out, expecting over 20,000.  It is our 100 year celebration of Georgetown basketball, so there will be many former players and coaches as well as a ton of famous Georgetown alumni.  Some of us are concerned that the team might tighten up a bit or be too pumped up for the game. 

As far as our team goes, we our frontcourt heavy.  Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert are future first round draft picks.  Hibbert is 7'2, fairly mobile, and is shooting over 70% from the floor for the season.  Sometimes he lacks aggressiveness, but the last few games he has been a man among boys.  Jeff Green is our glue guy.  He can do it all, handle the rock, pass, shoot 3's, drive, etc.  He makes us go.  He doesn't have to score to be affective, but he has to be involved in the offense or we seem to get a little stagnant.  Usually a big game from him = a win.  The 3 position has also become a strong spot for us with the emergence of freshman Dejaun Summers who is long, athletic and can shoot the 3.  He makes freshman mistakes and sometimes goes silent for long minutes, but at that point we bring in Ewing, Jr. who is high-octane all the time, good rebounder, but gets too wound up and picks up fouls like they are going out of style.  Our "weakness" is our guards.  I say weakness, but they are fairly solid.  They will not wow you with playmaking skills like Dom James, nor will they create too many turnovers, but they shoot a very high percentage from 3, and manage the game very well.  The key for us will be defending your guards.  We seem to have trouble at times stopping dribble penetration from quick guards.  We may play a good bit of zone to try and thwart that.

We have been playing are best basketball of the season by far.  We have won 6 in a row, and although we haven't played anyone spectacular, we have won by double digits every game except at Louisville, and only some late meaningless threes kept that score from being double digits.

Would love to hear more about the Golden Eagles or is it the Warriors?  Never understood that whole name change. 

[WashDCWarrior]

Welcome gtown100,
I think Saturday's game is going to be about who plays their style of basketball.  I know it's cliche, but very relevant in this game.  Georgetown wants to score with their big men in the half court set.  MU want's their guards to score in transition.  I'll guess if the final score is 68-62, Georgetown wins; if it's 78-72, Marquette wins.

Our strentgh is in our backcourt.  Dominic James gets the most press, but Jerel McNeal is our best all-around guard.  He can put up 20, 8, 8, and 5 steals any given night.  Really active defensively.  He does tend to get sloppy with the ball and can easily have 5 TOs.  Matthews is probably the most consistent.  Makes good decisions and tends to score a quiet 15 points most games.  Our fourth guard is David (DaVEED) Cubillan.  Solid ball handler, good defender, good 3-pt shooter, but doesn't penetrate or shoot many 2-pters at all.  Despite what the media says, we don't need James to have a super game for Marquette to be at its best.

Our frontcourt is largely unheralded, not nearly as good as our guards, but starting to play much better.  Ousmane Barro is having a breakout season and has had a number of double-doubles.  Hibbert will have trouble keeping up with him in transition, as he runs the floor really well.  Otherwise he'll get some baskets off of good passes, but doesn't create much on his own.  Next year.  Dan Fitzgerald is a 6'9 wing forward who can shoot the 3 and handle the ball.  His rebounding is improving, but if he's asked to matchup against Green, he'll have a tough time.  Lazar Hayward is a garbage basket-type scorer and is still making some freshman mistakes especially on defense.  Our other inside players are Dwight Burke, Jamil Lott, and we might play Mike Kinsella.  They'll probably combine for 5 points, 5 rebounds, and 12 fouls against Georgetown.

Looking forward to the game.  Marquette will have roughly 1,000 in attendance, so we're hoping to make some noise as well.  The 100 years celebration should be really cool with so many great players playing there.  Hope we're able to ruin for you. 

[gtown100]

I agree with you D.C. Warrior.  This game will come down to who controls the game.  Don't quote me on this, but I believe the Hoyas have never lost a game in the JT3 era when scoring over 70 points.   

The Hoyas have earned a rep for ruining celebrations.  When Syracuse had its last game in Manley Field House before they moved to the carrier dome, we beat them and John Thompson took the PA's mc and announced that "Manley Field House Is Officially Closed" - Thus, our rivalry with the 'Cuse.  We also beat them when they dedicated the court to Boeheim, when Nova celebrated their 25th anniversary of their championship we beat nova, and last night when the 'ville dedicated the court to denny crum.  Gtown is having a huge Gala at the Ritz on saturday night to celebrate.  Needless to say, the party would be a little dampened by an L.

The crowd will be interesting even for us Gtown fans.  Playing in a 20K seat arena, we don't fill it very often.  Last year against Duke, the crowd was amazing and paid huge dividends (Granted, us being ahead the whole time helped!), I think the crowd will be siliar to that game.  People are pumped, and if we beat you guys, we then have Pitt at home for a chance at a tie for first in the conference.

Are you guys deep off the bench?  We basically play an 8 man rotation, but our #8 - Macklin, is very raw, and gets minutes depending on the flow of the game.  For example, last night he only saw 2 minutes.

[WashDCWarrior]

I've seen a number of college, Wizards and Caps games there and I agree the crowd will be awesome (on both sides) but I don't see either team being flustered by it.  MU is 5-1 on the road this year (4-1) in conference, and 2-0 on neutral courts.

Depth has been fine so far this year.  Nine players average at least 9 minutes per game, but seven (James, McNeal, Matthes, Cubillan, Fitzgerald, Harward, and Barro) are consistently in the rotation.  I think we'll need to utilize our marginal big men for their fouls down low.  Barro has had good defensive games against Gray, McRoberts, etc., but we have trouble against teams with multiple quality big men which Georgetown has.  I don't know who can matchup with Green.  Also, McNeal and Fitz have a tendancy to get into early foul trouble so avoiding that is crucial.

[Tom Crean's Tanning Bed]

GTown...we're definitely looking forward to this weekend.  My flight heads out in about five and a half hours from Chicago  .

Short version on the nickname story....MU's President in 1993, Albert DiLulio unilaterially announced the nickname change effective in the 1994-1995 season.  10 years later, at commencement, chair of Board of Trustees offers $2 million for the return of Warriors.  School considers issue for year, and Board of Trustees votes not to return to Warriors, but replaces Golden Eagles with Gold in May 2005.  Students and alums protest, board abandons Gold, announces community vote.  Final two choices from 10 names is Hilltoppers (MU's original nickname) and Golden Eagles, Golden Eagles wins 54-46%.

We're playing about an 8 man rotation this year, occasionally dipping to about 9 depending on the matchups.  We've been playing an undersized 4 (Lazar Hayward at 6'6") for most of conference play, but we'll probably be starting Dan Fitzgerald on Saturday against the G'Town front line since he's got more height  at 6'9".  Expect MU to run a lot to exploit the lack of G'Town backcourt depth. 

Another poster below mentioned probably about 1,000 MU fans, but I think there will be quite a bit more, and some definite patches of Gold around the upper deck at the Verizon Center.  There's a pretty sizable MU alumni base on the east coast, and I've been told that the NYC and Philadelphia alumni clubs are bringing groups in as well. I know for example a group of 25 alums independent of MU getting a box at the Verizon Center. Not to mention flights from Chicago and Milwaukee have been fairly cheap (as low as $158 even as of Sunday), so I would expect probably double or maybe triple that in terms of MU fans this weekend.  Looking forward to Saturday, it should be quite a battle.

[tower912]

The Hoya's are a tough matchup for most teams, but probably moreso for us.   The key thing for you guys is how will your guards handle pressure.   MacNeal and James but ridiculous ball pressure on  the opposition guards.   If you guys are able to get in your sets every time down and Hibbert and Green are allowed to control everything down low, congratulations on your victory and we will see you at MSG.  If our guards disrupt yours, and we shoot over 40%, we have a decent shot at taking you.  We have been road Warriors in the league so far (4-1), and won at Pitt, so we shouldn't be intimidated.   Finally, James saves his best for big stages.   Look for him to go for at least 20.     Should be fun.   And I think we both can agree that somebody else needs to step up vs. Pitt.

[rocky_warrior]

For nickname information, see our Wiki

[WashDCWarrior]

Anther factor in how the game will play out is the officiating.  I think a loosely called game will favor us as we can be more agressive guarding their big men.  Conversely, if the zebras get whistle-happy, GU can live at the line.  I'm also expecting us to us the full-court and 3/4 press as much as any game so far this year.

[DoubleMU0609]

I agree that tempo will completely control the outcome of this game.  If we can run the floor I think we have a good chance.  (I can see Ooze getting a lot of easy buckets off fast breaks beating his man down the floor.)  However, if GT can get into their half-court sets we'll have a real problem with Green. 

How good of a perimeter defender is Green?  He definitely creates a match-up problem for us on the offensive end, but is Fitz going to be a match-up problem for them and get a bunch of open shots b/c Green isn't a quick as our 1-4?

[gtown100]

The big question will be how we come out and play you defensively.  I fully believe we will play a matchup type zone that we have been playing a decent bit of lately.  However, last year in the BE Tourney I remember us tweaking our zone and playing more of a 1-2-2, with someone long like a summers or Ewing up front against you guys.  We are a decent man-to-man team, however, JT3 loves to switch on everything.  And while Green can pretty much guard every position on the floor, Hibbert gets caught way too often guarding a PG.  This happened a decent amount last night against Louisville.

While tempo will matter, one thing that opposing teams don't realize is that up-tempo against Gtown is not regular up-tempo.  We do not give up that many fast break points.  The key for you guys will be the penetration and kick.  If you can knock down those threes we have a hard time collapsing and then closing out on shooters.  We over compensate for the drive because we know thats our weakness and leave shooters open (I'm talking zone here).  Cincinnati, St. Johns and Louisville all shot way above their regular three point percentages against us I believe. 

Villanova beat us by pressing us and we looked like a deer in headlights.  Hibbert had 0 (how is that possible?) SHOTS...not points, but field goal attempts!  We are a completely different team from back then.  Every team has pressured us since to little or no avail.  Good coaching!

As for the officiating, I am going to have to disagree with you DCWarrior. Gtown usually fares much better when it is loosely called.  We have bangers, and when the game is called tight we pick up tons of over the backs, offensive fouls, etc.  Our big guys have some finesse, but play a true Big East type of basketball.  We push, scrap, handcheck, bump.  That's Gtown style from the old days!

In the end, I don't think it matters how well your guards play if you can't stop our frontcourt.  When we control the paint, I am not sure any team in the Big East can beat us.  The key is stopping Hibbert and Green early.  they both run it seems a lot on confidence.  When they start slow in a game they never seem to get it together.   I think we happen to match up really well against you guys.  Your big advantage (guard play), will still have to finish amongst the trees, which a lot of teams have had problems with.  Should be a good one. 

[AlumKCof93]

GTown, thanks for the posts.  As I was watching you guys beat up L-ville last night, I was thinking of how nice it is to be in a conference with you guys.  Great tradition, great school, and class players.

[dwaderoy2004]

not gonna give you any more of a preview on our team...dcwarrior has done a good job of that.  i'll give a prediction of what i expect to see.  defensively, i believe crean will switch defenses frequently, to try and disrupt your half court offense and force turnovers.  we applied this technique very effectively against pitt.  secondly, we will attempt to deny, deny, deny the high post, because it seems a lot of your game revolves around green or ewing receiving a pass in the high post and then passing into the low post or a cutter, popping a jumper or taking it to the hoop.  i think crean will have us pick up the guards at about 3/4 court, but i still do not expect a full court press...i've come to realize crean just doesn;t do it.  

on offense, i believe we will attack the rim early and often, attempting to draw fouls on your bigs.  even if we don;t, hopefully we will cause your zone to sag even more (and you will be in a zone most of the game), allowing for open jumpers.  otherwise, expect our standard offense of first and secondary breaks, with ousmane barro attempting to beat your bigs down the floor every time, which he will be successful at doing.  how you defend the secondary break, and not just the primary, is a big factor in this game.

my prediction though:  whoever wins the rebounding battle wins this game.

[gtown100]

I don't know if you guys look or put any stock in Ken Pomeroy's ratings, but he has us ranked as the #1 offense (efficiency) in the country.  As a Gtown fan who remembers the days of Craig Esherick coaching where he would throw up a fist every time down the court and we dribbled around aimlessly for 35 seconds, this is a dream come true.  Sometimes he went with the double fist...just as effective!

Wade, Defensive rebounding is very important for us, limiting you guys to one shot.  Offensive rebounding though is not such a good predictor against us, because we shoot much fewer times than most teams, and are 2nd in the country behind Florida in FG%, so we don;t get nearly as many opportunites on the offensive glass as other teams.

I also think you will be very surprised at how well our big men get up and down the court.  For a 7'2 dude, Hibbert runs the court pretty well, while Green and Macklin are as quick and athletic as any big men in the conference.  Obviously, Louisville is not nearly as good as you guys, however there objective was to push the ball as well, and for any of you that watched the game, their transition game and secondary break had little effect.

Lastly, if you front the high post against us you open yourself up to the backdoor cuts a ton more.  That is why our "Princeton offense on Steroids" as we like to refer to it is so hard to guard.   Don't get me wrong, we are very beatable, but it takes usually takes a team deviating from their usual style to win against us when we are playing well.  Take Florida in the NCAA tourney last year.  They played a grind it out game against us to win.  I think we were by far the best game they had in the tourney.  You will have to execute in the halfcourt offense to beat us.

[dwaderoy2004]

we have the quickness to deal with cutters.  we don;t have the size to necesarily defend a high post-low post offense.  this is why i believe we will deny the high post first...