PREVIEW: Women’s basketball seeks first win in four games against DePaul

(Photo courtesy of Marquette Athletics.)

Facing off for the 83rd time, Marquette (9-5, 2-3 Big East) travels to the Wintrust Arena to take on its most played rival the DePaul Blue Demons (10-5, 3-1 Big East) Jan. 4 at 7 p.m. CST.

The Golden Eagles are coming off of a three game slide including losses to Colorado, Villanova and UConn.

In its New Year’s Eve matchup, Marquette couldn’t overcome a nine point first quarter deficit to UConn and lost by a score of 61 to 48. With just under six minutes left in the game, Marquette pulled within seven points, but an 8-0 UConn run shut the door on Marquette’s chances of winning.

Junior forward Liza Karlen led all Marquette scorers with 15 points on 7-for-16 shooting while pitching in six rebounds and two steals. First-year guard Emily La Chapell also played a career-high and Marquette-leading 36 minutes of the game.

DePaul hosted Creighton in its New Year’s Eve game, in which it fell to the Bluejays by a score of 92 to 82. Four Blue Demons scored double figures highlighted by sophomore forward Aneesah Morrow’s 33 points, 10 rebounds and five steals.

After last year’s fourth place finish in the Big East, DePaul lost three of its starters in Lexi Held, Deja Church and Sonya Morris. But head coach Doug Bruno brought back some key pieces this season.

Morrow and junior guard Darrione Rogers returned to the starting lineup again this season while two of the other starters were bench players last year in Jorie Allen and Kendall Holmes. DePaul’s fifth and final starter Anaya Peoples transferred in from Notre Dame.

Earlier in the season, DePaul beat a decent Miami team at home and followed that up by beating a good Maryland team on a neutral court for their signature win of the non-conference schedule.

Fun Facts:

DePaul is 5-3 in home games this season and 1-2 in its last three home games.
DePaul was picked to finish fourth in the Big East in the Coaches’ Preseason Poll while Marquette was picked sixth.
DePaul is Marquette’s most played opponent in Marquette’s history.
La Chapell was named the Big East Freshman of the Week this past week after averaging nine points and four rebounds in the two games during that time frame.

A Look Back:

Marquette trails 33-49 in the all-time series.
Nearly a year ago to the day, on Jan. 12, 2022, Marquette allowed the most rebounds by an opponent in a single game in their history when they played DePaul. DePaul recorded 52 rebounds in that matchup.
On that Jan. 12, 2022 matchup, then first-year forward Morrow recorded five blocks which is tied for the most blocks by a player against Marquette in their history.

Key Players:

Senior guard Jordan King is averaging team-highs of 14.5 points, 3.7 assists, 2.2 steals and 32.4 minutes per game. King only scored four points against UConn, but had racked up ten straight games scoring double-digits before that game.
Karlen is averaging 12.1 points per game. Karlen is also in the 96th percentile in the country for rebounds per game with 7.6 and is in the 95th percentile in blocks per game with 1.1. Her ability to alter shots at the rim has been an important part of Marquette’s defense.
Morrow is the fourth leading scorer in the country with her 26.3 points per game. The sophomore is also seventh in the nation in rebounding per game, averaging 11.9 rebounds, and 25th in steals per game with 2.9. Morrow has a usage rate (a stat measuring how often a possession ends with the ball in the players hand or through the net) of 38.8%, which is fifth in the country. Only four more players in college basketball are more offensively involved than Morrow.
Rogers is second on her team in scoring with 19.5 points and leads her team with 5.9 assists per game. Rogers is DePaul’s primary distributor and the DePaul offense starts with Rogers and ends with Morrow.

Keys to the Game:

Marquette: Slow the game down. DePaul has shot the fifth most total shots in the country and has given their opponents the the 11th most shots, meaning they like to play fast. Marquette should look to work get DePaul out of their rhythm by playing slower.
DePaul: Rebound. Both teams are prolific rebounding teams, the Blue Demons boast the 66th best rebounding rate in the country (53.7%), while Marquette has the 63rd best rebounding rate (53.8%).