What is the actual gap between Marquette and the top of the Big East

[MUbiz]

Despite considerable evidence that Marquette players improve under Shaka, quite a few Scoopers refuse to believe that players returning from last season probably will get better - with some possibly getting a LOT better.

And a coupla Eeyores who begrudgingly acknowledge that our players have improved, refuse to give Shaka and his assistants any credit for it.

Anyhoo ... I'm still saying the gap between St. Thomas and MU keeps widening, and just hope we can catch our Big East rival Tommies one day.

Shaka has developed players; yes, that is 100% true. I think some of us are skeptical of next years roster because the sophomores this past year did not make that leap and there is a reason to be concerned. Here is Kam Jones development - he took leaps forward every year:

Kam Jones PPG:
2021-22: 7.4
2022-23: 15.1
2023-24: 17.2
2024-25: 19.2

Here is the soon to be junior class:

Zaide Lowery PPG:
2023-24: 1.6
2024-25: 4.1 

Tre Norman PPG:
2023-24: 1.9
2024-25: 1.6

Sean Jones - will not have played in nearly 2 years - big question mark.

It is more than OK to question the 2025-2026 team. Especially since the players returning did not make that Kam, Tyler, O-Max jump that we have seen in the past.

[MU82]

Shaka has developed players; yes, that is 100% true. I think some of us are skeptical of next years roster because the sophomores this past year did not make that leap and there is a reason to be concerned. Here is Kam Jones development - he took leaps forward every year:

Kam Jones PPG:
2021-22: 7.4
2022-23: 15.1
2023-24: 17.2
2024-25: 19.2

Here is the soon to be junior class:

Zaide Lowery PPG:
2023-24: 1.6
2024-25: 4.1 

Tre Norman PPG:
2023-24: 1.9
2024-25: 1.6

Sean Jones - will not have played in nearly 2 years - big question mark.

It is more than OK to question the 2025-2026 team. Especially since the players returning did not make that Kam, Tyler, O-Max jump that we have seen in the past.

Norman's offensive shortcomings make it unlikely that he will take a statistical leap, but I don't think it's pollyanna to expect pretty big things from Lowery and even Jones next season. Lowery already improved a lot during the second half of last season, when he was healthy and earning PT.

I do understand the skepticism, I really do. But I not only am an MU hoops optimist, I have simply learned to give Shaka the benefit of the doubt until he gives me reason to do otherwise. I guess what I don't understand is why some Scoopers (not saying you) will not even consider giving Shaka that benefit of the doubt given how he has brought our program back from the dead.

Personally, I will be surprised if, at the end of the 2025-26 season, most Scoopers aren't pleased by the development of Parham, Owens, Lowery and Ross. Here's hoping Sean is back to full speed; if so, I will be surprised if he also doesn't improve a lot.

Now we've gone and done it, MUbiz - gotten all serious in Unk's VERY serious thread.

[MUDPT]

the Marquette roster as we know it to be for 2025/26 is close to StJ's and UConn, in your opinion? Care to explain? Imo, no MU player is a top 6 player for Pitino. Do I think StJ's runs the BE? Wouldn't surprise me if they did.

Chase would be top 6 on any Big East roster.

[Uncle Rico]

Chase would be top 6 on any Big East roster.

This reminds me of Tyler Kolek playing in the NBA this year and not staying in school.  #ballknower

[bilsu]

The gap is one year. First place 2027.

[Viper]

This reminds me of Tyler Kolek playing in the NBA this year and not staying in school.  #ballknower

Kolek got in the other night. Called-up from the G and playoff eligible. Knicks were down 25 no matta.  Nice 'Marquette' mention from Kevin Harlon on the call. Side note, how's your Baskin Robbins summer job going? Good on ya.

[Uncle Rico]

Kolek got in the other night. Called-up from the G and playoff eligible. Knicks were down 25 no matta.  Nice 'Marquette' mention from Kevin Harlon on the call. Side note, how's your Baskin Robbins summer job going? Good on ya.

NBA player, Tyler Kolek.  Wild

[TSmith34, Inc.]

Shaka's Chasm is a great way to describe how far Marquette has fallen.  Not sure that's a nickname that will be strong enough for anyone that's been a fan since 1865, but it's a good one

Earliest known picture of Dung Willie

[MUbiz]

Norman's offensive shortcomings make it unlikely that he will take a statistical leap, but I don't think it's pollyanna to expect pretty big things from Lowery and even Jones next season. Lowery already improved a lot during the second half of last season, when he was healthy and earning PT.

I do understand the skepticism, I really do. But I not only am an MU hoops optimist, I have simply learned to give Shaka the benefit of the doubt until he gives me reason to do otherwise. I guess what I don't understand is why some Scoopers (not saying you) will not even consider giving Shaka that benefit of the doubt given how he has brought our program back from the dead.

Norman's offensive shortcomings make it unlikely that he will take a statistical leap, but I don't think it's pollyanna to expect pretty big things from Lowery and even Jones next season. Lowery already improved a lot during the second half of last season, when he was healthy and earning PT.

I do understand the skepticism, I really do. But I not only am an MU hoops optimist, I have simply learned to give Shaka the benefit of the doubt until he gives me reason to do otherwise. I guess what I don't understand is why some Scoopers (not saying you) will not even consider giving Shaka that benefit of the doubt given how he has brought our program back from the dead.

Personally, I will be surprised if, at the end of the 2025-26 season, most Scoopers aren't pleased by the development of Parham, Owens, Lowery and Ross. Here's hoping Sean is back to full speed; if so, I will be surprised if he also doesn't improve a lot.

Now we've gone and done it, MUbiz - gotten all serious in Unk's VERY serious thread.

Personally, I will be surprised if, at the end of the 2025-26 season, most Scoopers aren't pleased by the development of Parham, Owens, Lowery and Ross. Here's hoping Sean is back to full speed; if so, I will be surprised if he also doesn't improve a lot.

Now we've gone and done it, MUbiz - gotten all serious in Unk's VERY serious thread.

I am one of those MU fans giving Shaka the benefit of the doubt. Shaka has earned the right to try it his way next year. And if his way is 100% of his high school recruits with no transfers, that is OK with me.

As far as the extremely critical scoopers - I understand where they are coming from - they saw the final 4 a few months ago and saw the aircraft carrier types and xfers and said "we need that".

The best way to explain how I am feeling about next years squad is - cautiously optimistic. I think a top 6 seed would be exceeding expectations, a 7-9 seed would be what I would expect and worst case is a bubble team.

[GoldenEagles03]

A light year? Might as well just call that a Buzz.

At any rate. This season and next season are already over. Won't 2028 ever get here. Ugh ..

[MU82]

NBA player, Tyler Kolek.  Wild

Impossible. Viper's BIL said, "No way!"

[tower912]

I look at the top seven, Gold, Parham, Lowery, Ross, Owens, SJones, and Norman, and I cannot wait for the season to start.  I look at Burke and Ooze, I mean Hamilton and Clark, and see opportunities and potential.   

The only reasons I see for pessimism is a lack of an obvious back up for Parham, and less experienced players in new roles.   Because of that, I acknowledge the lack of certainty.  I remain optimistic.

[MU82]

I look at the top seven, Gold, Parham, Lowery, Ross, Owens, SJones, and Norman, and I cannot wait for the season to start.  I look at Burke and Ooze, I mean Hamilton and Clark, and see opportunities and potential.   

The only reasons I see for pessimism is a lack of an obvious back up for Parham, and less experienced players in new roles.   Because of that, I acknowledge the lack of certainty.  I remain optimistic.

I share most of your optimism, tower. But barring an unforeseen portal addition, I do think we'll need solid contributions from a couple of our incoming freshmen, and maybe Clark, for MU to not have to sweat out an NCAAT bid. Certainly possible to get at least the kind of production we got from Kam or Royce, to name two under Shaka who played their roles well as frosh.

[BCHoopster]

How do you think Norman is in the Top 7?
He needs lots of improvement!  See Nigel getting minutes over him.  Defensively he can help.  Offensively he is as bad as Derrick Wilson, maybe worse. 

[Viper]

Impossible. Viper's BIL said, "No way!"

at least myself, and others, will put it out there for debate. You? Boring and predictable bullshiit. Nothing profound. Always predictable. You being you, I guess. But I will say this, those dentist's were not wrong.

[ATL MU Warrior]

I look at the top seven, Gold, Parham, Lowery, Ross, Owens, SJones, and Norman, and I cannot wait for the season to start.  I look at Burke and Ooze, I mean Hamilton and Clark, and see opportunities and potential.   

The only reasons I see for pessimism is a lack of an obvious back up for Parham, and less experienced players in new roles.   Because of that, I acknowledge the lack of certainty.  I remain optimistic.

See, I look at that lineup and ask myself who the go-to guy is when we need a bucket and the answer is I have no idea. And that's why I'm not optimistic.

[tower912]

Least of my worries. 
A.  Someone almost always emerges.
B.  I can see any of SJones, DO, Royce, Chase creating shots out of a stagnant set, depending on the match up and who is hot. 
C.  If Sean is able to create once he gets in the lane, problem solved.
D. I think Ben stops deferring and starts attacking like his epic dunks on Clingan and Kalkbrenner.

My biggest worry is whether or not Clark and Caedin can combine for 20-25 quality minutes.   If they can, I see twin towers with Ben playing stretch 4 while Royce rests.

[NCMUFan]

The question is do we have a single scorer.

[Farley36]

How wide is the Grand Canyon?

[tower912]

The question is do we have a single scorer.

Nope.  Several.

[Shooter McGavin]

I've said it before.  I think/hope Royce will play the Justin Lewis sophomore year role this year.  This will be like year one of Shaka all over again. 

What secondary talent emerges will he interesting.  Chase, Sean and Ben all have potential to do it in my eyes.  Hopefully Tower is correct and Ben is up to the task.  He needs to hunt his shot this year and drive with confidence.  Would love to have Zaide make a jump but he is truly not giving off even Kam sophomore year vibes yet as the statistics point out.  Hopefully those flashes become more consistent and we get a freshman/sophomore Kam hybrid year out of him. If we get pure sophomore year Kam production it's a bonus.  It would be nice to see DO and one of the fresheman take a step forward as well.  Will be fun to watch.  Nothing to do but watch it play out.

I'll be cautiously optimistic this offseason until I see the product on the floor. 

[Shaka Shart]

How wide is the Grand Canyon?

As wide as the distances between the logical hoops they needed to jump through needed to consider them a nonprofit

[DoctorV]

Least of my worries. 
A.  Someone almost always emerges.
B.  I can see any of SJones, DO, Royce, Chase creating shots out of a stagnant set, depending on the match up and who is hot. 
C.  If Sean is able to create once he gets in the lane, problem solved.
D. I think Ben stops deferring and starts attacking like his epic dunks on Clingan and Kalkbrenner.

My biggest worry is whether or not Clark and Caedin can combine for 20-25 quality minutes.  If they can, I see twin towers with Ben playing stretch 4 while Royce rests.

Many of this might be true, but even it if it is it could still mean a middle of the pack BE team that sits on the wrong side of the bubble.

That might be ok to some, and I guess it's probably ok to me since I just wish Shaka the best at this point and hope that he's here and successful for over a decade, but that doesn't change the likelihood that something is probably still missing.

I read this development aspect and I agree with it to some extent- Shaka has developed guys year in and year out.

However, I've mentioned this before, the guys that became our All Americans had something special about them from the second they stepped onto the court in a Marquette uniform.
That doesn't mean at that time we could've imagined they would be AA's, that's the Shaka development part, it just means that you could see the "special"

Namely-
1- Kam was an elite scorer and bucket getter from day one. Shaka even said so, you'd hear about it early and often and then see it very early on. Shocking the rankings for him were so low. Even now when you watch his HS clips you can just see the kid had a special talent of putting the ball in the basket.

2- Tyler Kolek was one of the best and most talented passers/distributors Marquette had ever seen. The rest of his game was a massive work in progress, and we didn't expect him to be a PG, but it was obvious from year one that he was a special distributor.

As an aside to this, it was also VERY obvious that Jop was a very good scorer, Shaka even said he would lead the BE in scoring so you could argue a bit of a letdown there.
Additionally, it was clear early that Stevie was a high end and nearly elite defensive player.

So, that's 4 guys that you could see from a pretty early stage in their MU careers having a special skill or skills and very elite abilities at the aspect of the game that they excelled at.

That's quite different than what we see currently IMO.
Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but you just don't see that as much from the existing and current crop. Meaning, you just haven't seen the "ELITE" skills that jumped off the page from their infancy.

Now, there are skills present.
-Chase is a very good 2 way player, will likely make an all BE team, but that's not TyKo or Kam level elite and that's ok. He also only has one more season.
-Royce has the projection of some very good to elite offensive skills as a stretch 4. He isn't shy, he's aggressive, and you can see that he could be a solid 3 year starter with AA potential if he develops
-I haven't seent it but I'll trust what others said about Damarius Owens being the next great star at Marquette. It was preseason, he got hurt, so the hope for stardom is still there.
-Zaide has potential to be a good/great two way player in the ilk of Chase. The +- doesn't show it but my eyes show a kid that can defend and has a good form in his shot when confident, he just needs to take the leap and score at all levels and distribute.

So you've got a few young potential "stars" and a few upperclassmen that should/could be All BE type players with proper development.
Then you've got a whole lot of hopeful projects.
I love me some SJ22, but calling him anything other than a hopeful project after that injury and time off is wishful thinking.
I can still hope for a massive Ben leap into All BE territory. I can still hope Tre, Caedin figure it out, Clark utilizes his elite height to become a star, etc etc but those are all hopes.

This also doesn't mean that Shaka can't win without an All American, because I'm sure he can. It just means that the development we hope for here is quite a bit different than that we hoped for in the recent past because we had a few guys that were ELITE and their skills before Shaka got to work.
Unfortunately, and I don't mean to be a negative Nancy here, those elite skills aren't at play as much with what we've currently got.

I will say as I finish this word vomit of a post I realize that the current crop actually does have some elite skills
Ex: SJ22's elite speed, Chase's elite leaping ability, Josh Clark's elite height, Parhams elite ability to not care that he missed a shot (that's not a dig either, Jop had that elite skill too)
They are just different than the types of skills that we were used to before, and that were more predictive of developing a star