Thanks to a conference-play high in points, Marquette women’s basketball (21-6, 10-6 Big East) coasted past Xavier (1-24, 0-16 Big East) 86-60 Saturday afternoon at the Cintas Center.
The Golden Eagles offensive outburst was propelled by their willingness to share the ball, stacking up 25 assists on 31 makes.
“We talked a ton coming into this game about ball movement, player movement and just making sure we give up good shots to get great shots,” Marquette head coach Megan Duffy said in a post game interview with FloSports.
“I didn’t think we were great today, but we did enough.”
Cleaning up the boards
Marquette has led the Big East in rebounding margin for virtually all of conference play, and on Saturday, the proof was in the pudding.
The Golden Eagles out-rebounded the Musketeers 39-21 (+18) by the time the final buzzer sounded. They had 15 offensive rebounds (Xavier had one) and scored 16 second-chance points (Xavier had zero).
“With rebounding it’s not just one or two people, it’s a group rebounding mentality,” Duffy said. “We were able to sustain Xavier’s physicality today and get enough boards.
“We had a couple kids with double-doubles, overall any road win is good.”
Graduate forward Frannie Hottinger was all over the place, grabbing five offensive boards en route to her fifth double-double of the season. It was more of the same for senior forward Liza Karlen, as her 10 rebounds were good enough for her ninth double-double of the year.
The two veteran post players grabbed as many boards (21) between themselves as the Musketeers did as a team.
Offensive explosion
Early in the season when Marquette was off to its program-record 12-0 start, the Golden Eagles had 3-4 players scoring in double digits every single night.
They had slowly gotten away from that style off offense as of late, but the flurry of points and assists that came on Saturday served as a reminder for just how good the offense could be.
Five Golden Eagles — Kenzie Hare (23), Rose Nkumu (13), Jordan King (11), Karlen (11) and Hottinger (10) — all finished in double figures.
“Mackenzie Hare led the way,” Duffy said. “A lot of people got to play which was awesome, a lot of our kids who work hard in practice so that was great to see.”
Along with all their starters, the Golden Eagles got support from their bench, with junior guard Lee Volker scoring nine points and dishing a season-high four assists.
Up next
Marquette returns home for senior night Tuesday against St. John’s at 7:30 p.m CST. The Golden Eagles fell to the Red Storm 57-56 in January.
“The goal for our program is always to be playing our best basketball here towards the end of February and March,” Duffy said. “We still haven’t gotten to that point but I think there’s still some bright spots ahead to do that.”
This story was written by Matthew Baltz. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter/X @MatthewBaltzMU.
