PROVIDENCE, R.I. — It went from bad to worse.
All night, that was the theme.
Maybe for the first seven minutes it wasn’t bad, but once Marquette men’s basketball gave up its lead after Ticket Gaines nailed a 3-pointer to give Providence the 16-14 advantage, it was a steady roll down the hill for the Golden Eagles for the remainder of the game — other than a 7-0 run start to the second half.
They went into the locker room down 40-29 after giving up a 10-2 run in the final three minutes of the first half, and trailed 60-41 with 9:45 remaining, their largest deficit of the night.
But the bad culminated with a foul on Chase Ross and flagrant 1 on Oso Ighodaro with three minutes remaining. The two fouls resulted in Devin Carter nailing two of his four free-throws and Marquette’s 6-0 run being halted dead in its tracks. All momentum, and with it any chance of a comeback, stopped right then and there.
By the end, the No. 6 Golden Eagles (9-3, 0-1 Big East) had played 40 minutes and didn’t look like themselves for the majority of them, ending in a 72-57 loss to the Friars (10-2, 1-0 Big East) Tuesday night at Amica Mutual Pavilion.
“We’re not going to win a lot of games scoring 57 points. So there’s a bunch of stuff as a team we need to do better on the offensive end, and Providence had a lot to do with that,” Marquette head coach Shaka Smart said.
“That being said, I think the basketball gods allow you to make more shots and finish better when you have ultimate connectivity, and we did not have that tonight for a few reasons. And that’s going to be our biggest emphasis moving forward.”
Marquette’s offense slowed to a halt
The 57 points scored was not just Marquette’s lowest point performance this season, but the fourth lowest amount of points it has scored in a loss during the Smart era. The only other three games were against St. Bonaventure (54 points) and UCLA (56 points) in Smart’s first year and against Mississippi State last season (55 points).
“We have a lot of guys out there that have played against their share of physicality in this league, even in this building, but for whatever reason that got our guys on our heels,” Smart said.
“We got the vast majority of our shots either in the paint or from three which is what we want. Didn’t make them. Providence did a good job of affecting a lot of those shots.”
On the night, the Golden Eagles finished shooting 18-for-56 from the field and 4-for-20 from beyond the arc, earning only seven assists on their made baskets and scoring a mere six bench points.
Conversely, Providence shot 22-for-51 overall and 11-for-32 from deep. The Friars pieced together 11 fast break points while the Golden Eagles had only four.
“There’s a tendency when you miss your shots that you feel like you should make, to get a little bit bummed out,” Smart said. “But the reality is, while you’re doing that, it’s taking you out of the moment and the other team is running the ball down the floor.
“Some of the plays in transition in the first half really were dominant plays for them.”
Another game without Mitchell
Tuesday was the third straight game that Marquette didn’t have its starting guard, junior Stevie Mitchell, available in the game.
With the loss of Mitchell comes a loss of aggressive on-ball defending and energy on-the-court.
“We missed his toughness. We missed his energy. Stevie’s a winner,” Smart said. “He’s the type of guy that affects winning in a lot of ways beyond the stat sheet. And we definitely missed that.”
It remains unclear when Mitchell will return.
Statistical leaders
Senior guard Tyler Kolek — in his homecoming game — finished with a team-high 21 points and nine rebounds, also dishing out five assists. Junior guard Kam Jones finished with 13 points on 1-for-6 shooting from deep and Ighodaro scored 11 of his own.
For Providence, junior guard Devin Carter put up a game-high 22 points to go along with eight rebounds, four assists and one steal. Gaines put up 18 points, shooting 5-for-10 from beyond the arc in 32 minutes of play.
Up next
Marquette travels back to Milwaukee to face Georgetown (7-5, 0-1 Big East) Friday night at Fiserv Forum. Tip-off is scheduled for 6 p.m. CST.
“There’s a ton of basketball areas that we need to do better,” Smart said. “I thought actually tonight there was, at time some of our guys were like a little embarrassed in how they were playing. It’s like hey, good teams will do that to you. Do what’s next.
“And that’s something obviously that we’ve got to spend some time on.”
This article was written by Jack Albright. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter/X @JackAlbrightMU.
