Todd Townsend's winning lay-up against South Florida looked familiar. Senior guard Travis Diener penetrated to his right, saw the double-team, and dumped the ball to the senior forward open on the baseline.
Just seconds earlier, USF point guard Brian Swift had orchestrated a similar drive-and-dish play on the other end of the court with clinical simplicity to take a temporary 64-63 lead.
Swift's penetration throughout the game raised questions about Diener's on-the-ball defense and the help-side post defense.
"What we wanted to do was to make (Swift) finish and stay home on the bottom," Marquette head coach Tom Crean said. "We didn't do that. We stepped up, thinking we could block his shot, when all he did was drop it off for dunks and layups."
"We helped too much," Crean added, meaning that no one was able to help the helper when a Marquette big man helped on Swift's penetration down the middle of the lane.
Crean said that he was hesitant to switch defensive assignments because he did not want to put Diener at a disadvantage guarding a taller USF wing player, but he put Townsend on Swift near the end of the game.
"Travis has to guard the dribble better, but we have confidence in him," Crean said. "We've not seen a guard this year that does as good a job at dropping it off as (Swift) does."
Swift finished with 10 assists, three of which came in an impressive 11-4 USF
run to close the first half. When the Marquette defense forced Swift to shoot from outside, his effectiveness decreased. He shot 3-of-13 from the field, and 1-of-7 from the 3-point line…
I'll put a spell on you
For the second consecutive game, the opponent's leading scorer cast a spell over the Marquette defense. Memphis forward Rodney Carney shot 10-of-20 from the field for 29 points Jan. 13. USF forward Terrance Leather scored 25 points Saturday on 8-of-11 shooting. In Thursday's game at DePaul, Marquette will face the top scorer in C-USA: Quemont Greer (21.5 ppg)…
Pack up the trailer
In each of its first three conference games, Marquette has trailed at the half.
The team trailed Tulane 38-31 before rallying to win and trailed 41-25 in the loss at Memphis. Marquette may want to kick this habit before upcoming games against DePaul, Charlotte and Louisville…
It's all just a little bit of history repeating
The last second victory over the Bulls on Saturday may have felt a little bit like deja vu. It was only a little bit over a year ago (Jan. 10, 2004) that Marquette beat Saint Louis at the Bradley Center, 61-59, with late-game heroics similar to those of Todd Townsend. With six seconds on the clock, Diener drove to the right side and hit a mid-range jumper to cap a Golden Eagles comeback after a sluggish first half.
However, Marquette would probably like this season to finish a little better than last. After the victory over the Billikens, Marquette went on to lose its next three in a row, and finished with a 19-12 record and failed to make the NCAA Tournament…
Hold on
Diener bounced back from a nine-turnover performance at Memphis by committing none in 37 minutes against South Florida…
This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Jan. 18 2005.