Really Good Day for the Future of Marquette Basketball

[wadesworld]

Freeman is barely seeing the court, but also responsible for Creighton's defensive struggles?
Could the loss of the four-time Big East DPOY have something to do with it as well?
And you'll never guess who leads Creighton in defensive box plus-minus.

As for Iowa, that might have something to do with Ben McCollum vs Fran McCaffery.

So he barely plays but his stats are relevant? But I do agree. Going from a great defensive center to an awful one has greatly hurt Creighton's defense. Good point!

He's been an absolutely terrible defender his entire career.

But yeah let's get another awful defender. That'll fix this team's problems.

[BCHoopster]

If you want to see soft, Freeman is right up there

[MU82]

Vanilla Soft Serve II?

[Pakuni]

So he barely plays but his stats are relevant? But I do agree. Going from a great defensive center to an awful one has greatly hurt Creighton's defense. Good point!

I'm really not sure what the point you're making here is. If your'e still arguing that Owen Freeman is the reason for Creighton's defensive problems, that's not supported by any data. In fact, at least one data point - DBPM -  indicates Creighton plays better defensively when Freeman is on the court.

He's been an absolutely terrible defender his entire career.

But yeah let's get another awful defender. That'll fix this team's problems.

Ben Gold, who gets glazed around here for his defensive improvement, has a career DRtg of 105.7.
Freeman, who's "been an absolutely terrible defender his entire career" has a career DRtg of 104.7.
And in case anyone is curious, Oso's career DRtg was 101.0.
Things that make you go hmmm.

[wadesworld]

I'm really not sure what the point you're making here is. If your'e still arguing that Owen Freeman is the reason for Creighton's defensive problems, that's not supported by any data. In fact, at least one data point - DBPM -  indicates Creighton plays better defensively when Freeman is on the court.
Ben Gold, who gets glazed around here for his defensive improvement, has a career DRtg of 105.7.
Freeman, who's "been an absolutely terrible defender his entire career" has a career DRtg of 104.7.
And in case anyone is curious, Oso's career DRtg was 101.0.
Things that make you go hmmm.

What's making you go hmm? Is that supposed to be some insignificant difference? Freeman's is closer to Caedin Hamilton's career defensive rating than he is Oso's. I'm not sure why you're trying to convince people Owen Freeman is some elite defender. He's an awful defender that rebounds well.

Ben's defense isn't the team's problem. He's also not some elite defender. So congrats to Owen for being close to a mediocre defender whose stats are skewed playing on this atrocious defensive team this year.

[Jay Bee]

"I was hard...like a fastball pitch..."

[brewcity77]

If Marquette is interested in a Freeman they recruited out of high school, Owen wouldn't be the one I'd want.

[Pakuni]

What's making you go hmm? Is that supposed to be some insignificant difference? Freeman's is closer to Caedin Hamilton's career defensive rating than he is Oso's. I'm not sure why you're trying to convince people Owen Freeman is some elite defender. He's an awful defender that rebounds well.

Well, now you're just making things up. Nobody is trying to convince anyone Freeman is an elite defender. Just pushing back on the nonsense that he's been "absolutely terrible his entire career" - he's hasn't been - or that he's to blame for Creighton's poor defense this year - he isn't.

[wadesworld]

Well, now you're just making things up. Nobody is trying to convince anyone Freeman is an elite defender. Just pushing back on the nonsense that he's been "absolutely terrible his entire career" - he's hasn't been - or that he's to blame for Creighton's poor defense this year - he isn't.

There's a reason he's playing 12 minutes per game on a team that is worse defensively than Marquette is (not a good thing!). It's certainly not the 62% from the floor he's shooting, I can tell you that much.

Maybe in year four next year a team of his will be in the top 120 in the country defensively.

[Pakuni]

There's a reason he's playing 12 minutes per game on a team that is worse defensively than Marquette is (not a good thing!). It's certainly not the 62% from the floor he's shooting, I can tell you that much.

Maybe in year four next year a team of his will be in the top 120 in the country defensively.

Marquette sits 102nd in defense this year, by far the worst of Shaka's tenure.
Clearly Nigel James' fault.

[1SE]

If only there were some meaningless games where we could see some extended run for Clark to figure out if he's soft and only gets the easy rebounds.

And he might be soft and only get the easy rebounds and we should Shakaxe him- or he might be a serviceable situational back up big. Who knows, let's see. But unless Shaka has already decided to give him the boot, I can figure out for the life of me why we aren't finding out the answer to those questions ont he court - so we have a slightly better chance at losing 20 games instead of 21? Who cares...

[MUbiz]

Freeman was damaged goods and I do not understand why any program paid him what they did. He had season ending finger surgery while at Iowa and then over the summer he had meniscus surgery and missed most of the summer. He did not practice with Creighton until October. He also has missed multiple games this year for injury/illness.

It was somewhat easy to predict he was not going to make a massive impact like the media talking heads told us he was.

[dgies9156]

Interesting series of comments on Coach Shaka's Saturday disclosure. My thoughts are:

1) Coach Shaka left Texas with a cloud over his head from his lack of tournament success. He can ill-afford another failure if he wants to stay in coaching.

2) The Marquette faithful are becoming very restless about this year's meltdown, particularly given the steadfastness with which we have eschewed the portal and over-emphasized traditional RGV.

3) If we don't right the ship and commit to doing something dramatic, the probability that Marquette will keep the true core of a rebuild -- James, Parham, Stevens, Phillips and possibly Owens -- is so low that one must excavate the left side of a Bell curve to find it.

4) Ditto for the very good recruiting classes that are on redshirt this year and will be joining us in the fall.

Simply put, I firmly believe the university put the basketball program on notice. I'm not sure they had to because Coach Shaka is a competitive guy and wants to win badly! But the basketball program is too important to Marquette's identity and to the university overall.

If we don't fix this problem expediently, this year's meltdown will be akin to comparing a melting candle to Chernobyl. We'll make DePaul look like an NCAA Champion and be playing and losing to Southern Illinois twice a year!

[wadesworld]

Marquette sits 102nd in defense this year, by far the worst of Shaka's tenure.
Clearly Nigel James' fault.

Nigel is CERATINLY part of the problem.  Sorry, I have no problem admitting when a player is not good defensively.  And our defense is still higher than Creighton's lol.  Nigel's also in year one of college basketball, while Freeman is in year 3, school 2, coach 2.  He was brought in to start at the 5, where they had a great defensive center who anchored defenses that ranked 32, 19, 14, 24, and 44 in defensive rating his 5 years at Creighton.  Freeman can hardly find the court despite shooting 62% from the field, and Creighton's defense is now 120th in defensive rating, which is the best defensive rating of any team Freeman has played on in his career.

But yeah.  He's a solid defensive player or something, and would definitely fix Marquette's problems.

[Pakuni]

Nigel is CERATINLY part of the problem.  Sorry, I have no problem admitting when a player is not good defensively.  And our defense is still higher than Creighton's lol.  Nigel's also in year one of college basketball, while Freeman is in year 3, school 2, coach 2.  He was brought in to start at the 5, where they had a great defensive center who anchored defenses that ranked 32, 19, 14, 24, and 44 in defensive rating his 5 years at Creighton.  Freeman can hardly find the court despite shooting 62% from the field, and Creighton's defense is now 120th in defensive rating, which is the best defensive rating of any team Freeman has played on in his career.

But yeah.  He's a solid defensive player or something, and would definitely fix Marquette's problems.

If you'd said Freeman was "part" of the problem at Creighton, we wouldn't be having this argument. You pinned it entirely on him while ignoring far more significant contributing factors.

[Jay Bee]

Imagine the dumb sh1t we must send recruits.  How does this keep happening? Charlie "Chaplin" 4 Ashes??

https://x.com/marquettembb/status/2023487756044038543?s=46&t=lNpN7iXqtrMrr3jfOK2gbA

[wadesworld]

If you'd said Freeman was "part" of the problem at Creighton, we wouldn't be having this argument. You pinned it entirely on him while ignoring far more significant contributing factors.

My point was that Owen Freeman wouldn't have fixed the issues with this Marquette team.  Would we be a better team with him?  Sure.  But he's not taking the 102nd ranked defense and making them any better.

I'd also argue that going from Ryan Kalkbrenner to Owen Freeman defensively really is THE reason Creighton's defense has gone from strong to trash.  It certainly isn't going from Steven Ashworth to Josh Dix (who isn't a good defender, but if you've watched Steven Ashworth play defense, well...).

[MarquetteMike1977]

Wrong thread earlier. Posting it here too since Marcus attends Marquette Basketball games.
Marquette Grad and Basketball booster Marcus Lemonis on Fox News now.
He said he graduated from a Catholic College on air but did not mention Marquette

[Pakuni]

My point was that Owen Freeman wouldn't have fixed the issues with this Marquette team.  Would we be a better team with him?  Sure.  But he's not taking the 102nd ranked defense and making them any better.

I'd also argue that going from Ryan Kalkbrenner to Owen Freeman defensively really is THE reason Creighton's defense has gone from strong to trash.  It certainly isn't going from Steven Ashworth to Josh Dix (who isn't a good defender, but if you've watched Steven Ashworth play defense, well...).

Except where they're getting killed this year is at the arc.
Last year they allowed teams to shoot 32.6% against them, 104th in the country. This year, teams are shooting 35.6%, which ranks 270th. I suspect that has little to do with who's guarding the paint.

And, again, Freeman isn't even starting, so I'm not sure how you think he's the primary issue.

[brewcity77]

You might be right, but listen again, I didn't get the impression that Shaka said "portal".

This was absolutely a message to major donors that he's going to use the portal. Period. There was no accident or savvy investigative journalism, this was Shaka & Broeker making sure their message got on national TV. Top of the broadcast, the camera panning to the away team GM, that wasn't accidental.

The message has been delivered to the athletic department that donors expect Marquette to use all their resources to compete, and the response was done publicly so the donors know that message was received, will be followed, and to let potential portal recruits know that Marquette is back on the menu as a transfer destination.

[rocky_warrior]

Brew, I don't disagree, but despite all the intention, I'm shocked they played their actual wording so soft.   I've discussed it plenty in this thread, and don't need to rehash.

[CountryRoads]

The message has been delivered to the athletic department that donors expect Marquette to use all their resources to compete

...and use those resources efficiently and with common sense. Hopefully no more big bonuses for chest bumps at practice or having a certain look in the eye.

[WhiteTrash]

...and use those resources efficiently and with common sense. Hopefully no more big bonuses for chest bumps at practice or having a certain look in the eye.

If you are commenting on the presumption that MU runs a flat compensation package based upon time in the program, I couldn't agree more. MU must react to the present market conditions or guys like James will walk and end of the bench guys will continue to milk the MU cow for all it is worth.

This is professional sports and the highest performers will demand to get paid the most. If MU doesn't then 330 other programs will. My good friend's son played in the MEAC and the highest paid players were transfers. The compensation levels were not high but always skewed to the top players and getting the top players.