Everything.
That was the first word out of Marquette head coach Shaka Smart’s mouth in response to being asked what he thought was different about Georgetown this season compared to previous years.
“I mean, everything’s different,” Smart continued. “They have better players; they are playing to coach Cooley’s personality, which is as important as anything.”
The Georgetown Hoyas — a once proud program that boasted yearly tournament appearances and 20-win seasons under John Thompson — had become a yearly bottom feeder in the Big East ever since the end of Thompson’s tenure in 2017.
But at the start of last season, there was a new hope in the air. Cooley had just arrived on campus, ready to restore the prestige of a once-so-proud program. Despite going 9-23, the talent was on its way, and you knew it was only a matter of time before Georgetown was going to be causing headaches for its opponents.
Fast forward to early January of 2024. The Hoyas are in Milwaukee to face off against the Golden Eagles in a battle of two-loss conference foes with the winner moving into first place in the Big East.
The scoreboard reads 63-62. Drew Fielder has just knocked down a 3-pointer to put Georgetown up with 3:13 to go. On the road, against a top 10 team.
Now what was that about bottom feeders again?
“It’s a far cry from the Georgetown team we played last year,” Smart said. “[We] told the guys that coming in, but then when you feel it, and you experience it on the floor, I think it still takes some adjusting on the guy’s part to understand that this is a team to really be reckoned with in our league.”
In the first half, the Hoyas were more than just a force to be reckoned with, they were dominant. Georgetown led the Golden Eagles in pretty much every category you could think of after 20 minutes of play.
However, thanks to a 16-4 run in which Chase Ross scoring eight of his 17 second-half points, Marquette flipped the script on Georgetown.
Despite going on a run to get back into the game, the challenge Marquette faced at the under-four media timeout was winning the game.
Down by one with 2:19 to play, David Joplin stepped up to the line to nail a pair of free throws. Then, it was Jones and Mitchell connecting for a deuce, and then finally another two points from the charity stripe by Ross.
Marquette had gone on a 12-3 run in the final two-and-a-half minutes, going 10-for-10 on free throws en route to sealing a 74-66 win at Fiserv Forum.
“Winning ugly means grimy, vicious,” Ross said. “Just doing anything you have to do to win the game, win a possession, win the half. Literally anything, no holds barred.”
It was a career-night for Ross, as he scored a career-high 27 points on 7-of-12 shooting while also swiping away a career-high six steals.
“He was phenomenal,” Smart said. “A blind man could see that. He was the best player on the floor in this game, and that’s saying a lot because they had a lot of really good players out there and we had some good players out there.”
Entering Tuesday, Marquette came in averaging the fewest turnovers per game in the country, to which Georgetown scoffed during the first 20 minutes. After forcing the Golden Eagles into eight first half turnovers, the Hoyas clung to a nine-point lead heading into the break.
“I thought our defense was excellent,” Georgetown head coach Ed Cooley said after the game. “We’re going to have to be a little bit more aggressive to get to the foul line, as it was a hell of a discrepancy in free throws…
“It didn’t go our way today, but I couldn’t be more proud after a loss than what I saw how our men fought today. We were elite defensively.”
Ultimately, the Golden Eagles’ experience, energy and aggressiveness were too much for the Hoyas to handle. Ben Gold’s four steals and four blocks, Stevie Mitchell’s three steals and usual hand activity, and of course, Ross’s record night. It was all just too much for them to prevail over.
“A couple didn’t bounce our way, it’s okay, we’ll learn from it,” Cooley said. “It’s not the end of the world and people gonna have come back through that DMV, and I’m really looking forward to some home games, really looking forward to some home games.”
Ten have tried at Fiserv this season, and ten have failed at Fiserv this season.
To Wintrust Arena the Golden Eagles go.
This story was written by Matthew Baltz. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter/X @MatthewBaltzMU.
