I understand why Texas was done with Shaka

[Hards Alumni]

Don't play him then? Let Zaide loose. Blind loyalty. Chase too. Guy clearly had a broken thumb or wrist and we still allowed him to go out there and jack up shots all year.

Ross played 38 minutes and had a line of 5 points, 2 Reb, and 2 Assists. 

Zaide played for 15 minutes last night, and had 4/3/0.  And he was healthy.

Stevie's defense, even when injured is elite, and that's why he played.  He's a senior and it's the tournament.  I'm sure he wanted to play the entire game, but was clearly injured.  Even though he was, he was still the best option when he could go.  He scored 11 and 16 in his previous two games.

Do people just say things around here without checking stats?  Yes, what was I thinking, of course they do.  Clown ass behavior.

[Fieldhouse Flyer]

Congratulations on another very good season, and stop beating yourselves up over the loss.

Marquette Warriors Final 2024-25 Results – ESPN  • Big East Final 2024-25 Standings – ESPN 

2024-25: 7-seed, lost to 10. Underperformed seed expectation.
2023-24: 2 seed, beat 15 & 10, lost to 11. Underperformed seed expectation.
2022-23: 2-seed, beat 15, lost to 7. Underperformed seed expectation.
2021-22: 9-seed, lost to 8. Met seed expectation.
2020-21: 3-seed, lost to 14. Underperformed seed expectation.
2019-20: No tournament (COVID) [see ESPN excerpt below]
2018-19: NIT
2017-18: 10-seed, lost to 7. Met seed expectation.
2016-17: Missed postseason.
2015-16: 6-seed, lost to 11. Underperformed seed expectation.
2014-15: 7-seed, lost to 10. Underperformed seed expectation.
2013-14: 5-seed, lost to 12. Underperformed seed expectation.
2012-13: 5-seed, beat 12, lost to 4. Met seed expectation.
2011-12: 12-seed, beat 5, lost to 4. Beat seed expectation.

It has been 13 years since a Shaka-coached team performed better than their seed in March. He's only matched seed expectations  3 times in that span, and 2 of them are because 9-16 seeds aren't expected to win any games.

Shaka hasn't beaten a single digit seed since 2012.

He's had regular season success that we have not seen in a long time, but college basketball is about March. Shaka has not met expectations in March for 13 years.

IL Warrior – thank you for your excellent post. Much appreciated.

NCAAtournament Bubble Watch: Updated look at the wildest bubble in years - John Gasaway, ESPN – March 11, 2020

Big East

Locks: Seton Hall, Villanova, Creighton, Butler

Should be in:

Providence Friars

Whatever Ed Cooley is doing with this offense, he should keep doing it. Providence ended the season with six straight wins, and over that stretch, the Friars recorded a robust 1.11 points per possession. Those numbers were helped along by Providence's 93-55 win over DePaul in the season finale, a game in which A.J. Reeves, Nate Watson, Alpha Diallo and David Duke all scored at least 16 points. With a top-40 NET ranking and a projected No. 9 seed in the mock brackets, high-scoring Providence is entering the Big East tournament on a high note.

Marquette Golden Eagles

For a second consecutive season, Marquette is staggering to the finish line. With their 88-86 defeat at St. John's, the Golden Eagles closed the regular season by losing six of seven games. In theory, Steve Wojciechowski's men should still be fine. Marquette had a top-25 NET ranking and was being shown as a No. 8 seed in the mock brackets before the loss to the Red Storm. Nevertheless, that projected seed will continue to fall, and a loss in the quarterfinals at the Big East tournament would, at a minimum, raise the question for the first time of whether this team is really going to get a bid.

Work to do:

Xavier Musketeers

We don't know with certainty that the Musketeers won't make the tournament, but we do know Kamar Baldwin didn't help matters. It was Baldwin who sank the winning 3 for Butler at Xavier on the last day of the regular season. The loss bumped Travis Steele's men down to the No. 7 line in the Big East tournament bracket, where they promptly lost 71-67 to DePaul. That goes into the books as a Quad 2 defeat, which, ordinarily need not be disastrous. A projected NCAA tournament No. 11 seed like the Musketeers, however, cannot afford to take these chances.

And look on the bright side. You didn't lose to Chattanooga by 15 point in the NIT today.

Best of luck going forward. You have a great HS Class of 2025 arriving in the fall:

Marquette 2025 Basketball Commits – 247 Sports

[Hards Alumni]

no one asked.

[willie warrior]

Agree. I think there will be some changes coming.
Not have SJ available was certainly a bummer. Would have really helped Kam.
Shaka knows what has to be done. I would expect a player or two to leave and that will open up some options.

How are you assured that Shaka knows what has to be done? If he did, how can this year be explained.

[The Rural Juror]

when 37% of your scoring comes from threes, but you're 236th in the country in 3p%, and you eschew even attempting to get offensive boards in favor of getting back on defense, then a)that's a recipe for early tourney exits, and b)who can you blame but the coach? at what point does being critical of this obviously mismanaged team stop being "bad fans" or "childish posters"'and simply become an adult conversation about Shaka Smart and his obvious, longstanding deficiciencies?

[jesmu84]

when 37% of your scoring comes from threes, but you're 236th in the country in 3p%, and you eschew even attempting to get offensive boards in favor of getting back on defense, then a)that's a recipe for early tourney exits, and b)who can you blame but the coach? at what point does being critical of this obviously mismanaged team stop being "bad fans" or "childish posters"'and simply become an adult conversation about Shaka Smart and his obvious, longstanding deficiciencies?

I actually love the 3 shooting offense - when it's not stepbacks/pullups/off the dribble.

But then gotta sincerely recruit or develop 3 shooters

[PointWarrior]

And look on the bright side. You didn't lose to Chattanooga by 15 point in the NIT today.


Even more depressing now - Marquette lost to a Dayton squad who lost to Chattanooga by 15.

[Vander Blue Man Group]

And look on the bright side. You didn't lose to Chattanooga by 15 point in the NIT today.


Even more depressing now - Marquette lost to a Dayton squad who lost to Chattanooga by 15.

Yes, the transitive property is proven method of analysis. 

[TAMU, Knower of Ball]

when 37% of your scoring comes from threes, but you're 236th in the country in 3p%, and you eschew even attempting to get offensive boards in favor of getting back on defense

We were the 179th best offensive rebounding team in the country.  That's pretty much exactly average.  We were 4th in Big East play

[Galway Eagle]

Even more depressing now - Marquette lost to a Dayton squad who lost to Chattanooga by 15.

Ok negative Nancy. We also beat two of the current sweet 16 teams. That's as irrelevant as the Dayton loss now.

[Big Papi]

Having listened to Shaka speak numerous times during the season about Sean coming back from injury, I think he fully expected him back this year.  He sounded very disappointed when the announcement was made that he would wait until next year to come back.  I do think Sean would have helped a lot if he played this year and we would have seen the best of Kam the shooter if that did happen.

I wonder, and it's purely speculation from someone who posted it once on here, that there is a chance he could go elsewhere.  I was quick to dismiss but maybe it could happen and if it did it could be because of that decision. 

[Galway Eagle]

I wonder, and it's purely speculation from someone who posted it once on here, that there is a chance he could go elsewhere.  I was quick to dismiss but maybe it could happen and if it did it could be because of that decision. 

Sean or Shaka?

[Big Papi]

Sean or Shaka?

Sean

[NCMUFan]

Did anyone say vacate?

[willie warrior]

Ok negative Nancy. We also beat two of the current sweet 16 teams. That's as irrelevant as the Dayton loss now.

Beating those 2 teams was 3 months ago. The last almost 3 months the tram has been flameout city. This should be a real cause for concern,

[Galway Eagle]

Beating those 2 teams was 3 months ago. The last almost 3 months the tram has been flameout city. This should be a real cause for concern,

So it's ok to still cry about losing to a team 3 months ago but not ok to bring up the impressive wins? Neither is relevant to now.

And yes I agree the last two months (we were fine till NMD if I recall) have been hugely disappointing

[Uncle Rico]

Beating those 2 teams was 3 months ago. The last almost 3 months the tram has been flameout city. This should be a real cause for concern,

Was the tram going to Shelbyville?

[MuMark]

Always appreciate posters who help me out with my ignore list by posting these kind of topics.

[willie warrior]

So it's ok to still cry about losing to a team 3 months ago but not ok to bring up the impressive wins? Neither is relevant to now.

And yes I agree the last two months (we were fine till NMD if I recall) have been hugely disappointing

The flameout is relvant because it just happened. If you are not concerned about that, congrats on being accepted to COLE

[Galway Eagle]

The flameout is relvant because it just happened. If you are not concerned about that, congrats on being accepted to COLE

The flameout is different than Dayton Willie. We were still in that stretch of being a good team that had an anomaly. Flameout would've been mentioning Nova, X, Creighton, UConn x2, SJU x3, or NM

To your second sentence I think you default to anger to quickly and don't realize when a person literally writes they agree

[Vino-D]

Shaka took over a program from WOJ that was a complete mess, so what is the solution,Tom Crean, fired twice, Buzz Williams, his leaving MU was disgraceful. The fact of the matter is, is that the talent was not as good as we thought. Kam Jones was the only player that could create his own shot, and when teams found out MU couldn't shoot 3's consistently, they started zoning MU to take away the middle from Kam, and when you can't punish teams playing zone by making 3's, you have trouble winning. My view is that Shaka did one of his best coaching jobs this season, because he got more out of what he had to work with, and that's what good coaches do. They had early success until the zones started appearing to stifle Kam, and dare MU to make 3's, which they could not do consistently enough. Stevie and Chase are inconsistent shooters at best, and Jop was hot some games, and others he couldn't mail it in if the postage was prepaid. Which brings me to Ben Gold. Some games he disappeared faster than Houdini, and in the BE semifinal game against St. John's at the MSG, he played scared and looked intimidated the whole game. He's definitely talented, but he needs to develop his inside game, which will provide better opportunities for him to shoot 3's, and, he needs to get in the weight room and toughen up. I think Shaka got as much out of what he had to work with as he could, and look at what he's done over the last 4 years. Under WOJ, MU was not even an afterthought, we weren't even in the conversation. There's talent on the roster, and he has a really good recruiting class coming in. I'm not worried about the program, it's headed in the right direction, and he clearly sees the big picture. NIL has changed the college mens bball landscape, and MU knew that Shaka wanted to build from within when they hired him, and his approach is novel, but so far I have no complaints. Under WOJ we had 7 years of mediocrity, and under Shaka MU is and will always be in the conversation...and I like that!

[willie warrior]

The flameout is different than Dayton Willie. We were still in that stretch of being a good team that had an anomaly. Flameout would've been mentioning Nova, X, Creighton, UConn x2, SJU x3, or NM

To your second sentence I think you default to anger to quickly and don't realize when a person literally writes they agree

Don't see any anger at all. Too many people on this board have low expectations as evidenced by the excuses offered for this year's performance flameout. If you have higher expectations, great. So do I. But the direction does not feel right for that.

[Hards Alumni]

Don't see any anger at all. Too many people on this board have low expectations as evidenced by the excuses offered for this year's performance flameout. If you have higher expectations, great. So do I. But the direction does not feel right for that.

No, little willie.  Our expectations are irrelevant.  This is a message board.  We are not the administration.  We are a bunch of dumbasses on the internet talking about basketball.  You're imploring us to have higher expectations.  What would an angrier message board do?  Do you think it would have ANY material impact on the program?  If this entire place was just bitching about our coach not being Al McGuire do you think it would solve anything?  Would you feel better?

No one likes losing, but if you can find a way to assure wins year in and year out you should probably be a coach.  You'd be undefeated, I'm sure. 

But you can't do any of those things.  You're just a dumbass on a message board along with the rest of us.

[PointWarrior]

Ok negative Nancy. We also beat two of the current sweet 16 teams. That's as irrelevant as the Dayton loss now.

But we lost to Dayton while we were supposedly a good team at the time.  That's even worse now that you point that out. 

[tower912]

It is a fact that Shaka's record at Texas was remarkably similar to Wojo's at MU.