After falling to Villanova due to poor shooting Friday, Marquette women’s basketball turned things around Sunday and defeated the Georgetown Hoyas 76-56 in the nation’s capital.
Following a season-long trend, it was the second-half performance from the Golden Eagles that gave Marquette the win, outscoring the Hoyas 34-20 in the third and fourth quarters.
Junior guard Selena Lott and senior forward Altia Anderson combined for 25 of Marquette’s 34 second-half points.
Both teams traded shots in the first half. At the end of the first quarter, it was knotted up at 21-21 with Georgetown’s Tatiana Thompson knocking down a 3-pointer with 16 seconds left in the frame.
After trading the lead with Georgetown for the entire quarter, it wasn’t until the 4:29 mark of the second half that Marquette was able to find their groove on offense. First-year guard Jordan King made a layup and drew the and one starting a 13-8 run for MU to the end of the quarter, giving MU a 42-36 lead into halftime.
In the first half, the Golden Eagles shot 63% from the field and 75% from the charity stripe.
MU stormed out to a 7-0 run to begin the third quarter, forcing Georgetown to burn an early timeout. Despite Georgetown’s defense holding Marquette scoreless in the final 2:45 of the frame, the Hoyas found themselves down 10 heading into the final quarter.
A 13-2 run over a span of 4:21 and holding Georgetown to shooting just 25% from the field in the fourth quarter, Marquette was able to cruise to their 76-56 win.
Lott led the way for Marquette with 18 points shooting 5-for-8 from the field, four assists and one steal.
“I kinda teased her at halftime and was like, ‘Now you got some fresh legs from sitting out for that whole first half, it seemed,'” head coach Megan Duffy said of Lott. “She is such a key part of our offense. Great distributor, shoots the ball really well. She stepped up big for us, thought her defensive pressure in the third and fourth quarter was really good.”
Two other Marquette players scored double-digit points: Anderson put up a career-high 16 points, and redshirt-junior forward Lauren Van Kleunen put up 15. It is the 17th time this season that Van Kleunen scored in double-digits and the eighth time the Mason, Ohio, native scored 15 or more points.
Taylor Barnes led the way for Georgetown with 15 points, shooting 5-for-13.
The Golden Eagles entered and finished the day with a half-game lead for second place in the BIG EAST standings as Butler came from behind to beat Providence at Hinkle Fieldhouse. Next weekend will be a big weekend of hoops as the Bulldogs play two games while the Golden Eagles just have one.
With 13 days until the BIG EAST Tournament at Wintrust Arena in Chicago, today’s win over the Hoyas gave Marquette a first-round bye. The team will play its first game in the quarterfinals March 7.
Marquette (21-7, 12-5 BIG EAST) returns home for its regular-season finale against No. 13 DePaul Sunday at 2 p.m.
This article was written by John Leuzzi. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @JohnLeuzziMU.
