“The March Toward March” is a column by Curran Rastogi about men’s college basketball teams and their journeys to March Madness.
The Big East Preseason Coaches Poll was released October 18, projecting Marquette to finish ninth in the conference. Someone forgot to tell Marquette’s head coach Shaka Smart. The Golden Eagles are 22-6 overall with a 14-3 conference record and on the inside track to claiming their first regular season Big East title since 2013.
The first thing you notice about Marquette basketball this year is that they are undeniably a Shaka Smart team. Smart, in his Cinderella Final Four run in 2010 with VCU, employed what is colloquially referred to as “havoc” defense. This on-ball defense suffocates opponents into bad shots and turnovers. While Smart didn’t use it as much at Texas, at Marquette it is clearly back in full force.
Marquette is the clearest example of defense leading an elite offense. While the goal in havoc defense isn’t necessarily to rack up as many steals as possible, Marquette is No. 9 in the nation in steals per game. The frequency to which Marquette’s players accumulate steals allows them to get out in transition to collect easy points. The Golden Eagles are No. 3 in offensive efficiency according to KenPom because of it. Six players on this team average at least 1 steal a game, with junior guard Tyler Kolek and sophomore guard Stevie Mitchell averaging 1.8 and 1.7 respectively.
It’s not just their defense that allows this team to be an elite offensive team. They share the ball well and have an offensive setup that generates very good looks. Key to their offense is a double screen play, where a ball handler will receive two consecutive screens and drive to the paint where he decides to pass to the rolling big man or take the shot himself. The advantage of this play is that it makes the ball handler’s defender work much harder, as he has to fight through two screens, which frees up the ball handler. It might create a mess in the middle of the court for the guard, but with the play being run for Kolek very often, he has become adept at navigating this traffic.
Kolek is a current favorite for Big East Player of the Year, leading the conference in assists per game at 7.6. Though not the leading scorer on the team, his scoring has become instrumental in Marquette’s last two games against No. 16 Xavier and No. 19 Creighton. He scored a go-ahead floater against Creighton over 7-foot-1-inch 2021-2022 Big East Defensive Player of the Year junior center Ryan Kalkbrenner. Kolek is the heart and soul of the team and the type of player that will be key to the Golden Eagles making a run in the NCAA tournament.
Come March, two more players stick as players that will elevate the team and add the scoring and defense that becomes necessary. Mitchell and junior forward Oso Ighodaro are the team’s perimeter and frontcourt defensive stoppers. Mitchell regularly gets assigned to the other team’s best guard but can also provide a spark of offense that propels the team going forward. Ighodaro’s pressure on Kalkbrenner was key to the Golden Eagles largely neutralizing during the game, and on offense, he has the basketball acumen to operate a pick and roll at a very high level.
However, for Marquette to be a serious team and make a Final Four run, they will need leading scorer sophomore guard Kam Jones to be a more consistent scorer. Jones is a good and capable leading scorer, but this month he’s only put up 10 or more points twice which is simply not good enough for a leading scorer. He led the team with 19 points in their most recent game against Creighton, but it remains to be seen if this game will be the one to break his slump.
Aside from Jones’ streaky month, February has been great for Marquette. The Golden Eagles won five of six including two wins against two teams tied for second in the Big East. They currently have a two-game lead in the title race with three games to go against teams already largely eliminated from the NCAA tournament.
Marquette has all the tools necessary to make it back to the Sweet Sixteen for the first time since 2013. Smart has done a remarkable job as head coach after losing his two best scorers to the G-League and should be a shoe-in for Big East Coach of the Year. Maybe next year the Big East coaches will learn their lesson and pick them to finish eighth.
“The March Toward March” runs every Thursday.