No one would classify the Marquette women’s basketball team’s victory over the No. 17 Georgetown Hoyas as pretty, but no one has to.

A win is a win is a win.

“It was ugly, we know it was ugly,” Marquette coach Terri Mitchell said. “But it’s a victory, and it’s a game to build upon because in the Big East nothing is easy.”

Junior Angel Robinson was the key to the match as the Golden Eagles overcame a season-worst 30 turnovers to take down the Hoyas 52-45.

Robinson’s 20 points led Marquette but it was another statistic that made all of the difference. The pre-season All Big East Team selection committed 12 turnovers in the game to complete the infamous points and turnovers double-double.

“I played a not so great game in my eyes,” Robinson said. “Twelve turnovers is embarrassing to me.”

Of those 12 turnovers, however, only one came in the final 12 minutes of play as Marquette rallied to take the game.

“I just had a better sense of urgency towards the end of the game,” Robinson said. “I was just really focused on my team.”

Her focus paid off as she was able to cut down on the giveaways and take the ball to the basket instead. This resulted in Robinson scoring eight points in the final minute.

“I love how Angel recovered,” Mitchell said. “Sometimes Angel wants something so much, it can affect her the other way. She knew she was messing up and it was affecting her, and then she just decided, she just locked down and thought, I gotta be the attacking one.”

As a team, Marquette dramatically improved in the latter stages of the second half.

Mitchell said she was proud that her team was able to draw a line in the sand and commit only one turnover in the last eight minutes.

Marquette’s 30 combined turnovers played such a key role because they interrupted the flow of the game and kept the team from taking shots, let alone making shots. Marquette only shot 35 times, compared to 49 shot attempts from Georgetown.

“Georgetown does an incredible job with its defense, causing us into all those turnovers,” Mitchell said.

However, the Golden Eagles forced 26 turnovers of their own, to keep the game close.

“We forced them into a turnover and turned right back around and turned it over,” Georgetown coach Terri Williams-Flournoy said. “That means we lost 26 offensive possessions to score.”

Marquette’s defense has to be credited with forcing the Hoyas into committing nine more turnovers than their season average.

“We’re a very good defensive team, we pride ourselves on defense,” senior Lauren Thomas-Johnson said. “I think we force teams into playing ugly.”

In a ping pong type of game where both teams kept giving the ball back to each other with turnover after turnover, Marquette’s focus and sense of urgency ended up paying off in the end.

“In the end we just slowed down,” Thomas-Johnson said. “We attacked, listened to coach Terri [Mitchell] and got by them.”