The Quick & The Dirty: Villanova 84, Marquette 49

In the opening game of the quarterfinal round of the 2015 Big East Tournament, YOUR Marquette Golden Eagles fell to the #1 seed Villanova Wildcats, 84-49, as the Wildcats tied a school record and Big East Tournament record for made three pointers in a game.

The entire game can be summed up by the very first possession of the game.  Villanova won the opening tip, and on the first shot of the game, Darrun Hilliard buried a long three pointer with two blue jerseyed hands in his face.  They just didn't miss from long range, or at least that's what it seemed and/or felt like.  Let's put it another way:

And Villanova ended the game with 51 points from 3s. Marquette had 49 overall. That's incredible. #mubb

— Brian Baranowski (@BBaranowski) March 12, 2015

While an 8-0 run by MU would make it 18-16 favoring the Wildcats at the 11:27 mark of the first half, Villanova responded to Marquette getting that close by going on a 17-0 tear.  The first 11 of those points, though?  They came off the hand of Josh Hart all by himself.  Luke Fischer would finally end the run to make it 35-18, and that was pretty much that, really.

It was obvious that Jay Wright watched last night's game against Seton Hall.  Matt Carlino nearly singlehandedly destroyed Seton Hall with his shooting, as he tied the Big East Tournament single game record for three pointers in a game.  Here, though, Carlino was held without a basket for the entire first half and he barely even touched the ball along the way to intermission.  He finished just 2-11 overall and a lackluster at best 1 for 8 behind the three point line.

Derrick Wilson finished with team highs in points with 11, rebounds with 6, and assists with 9.  He also had a horrifying nine turnovers in his final game as a Golden Eagle, although it's hard to say that it really had an impact on the game when you lose by 35.  Josh Hart led Villanova to the win with 20 points off the bench, eventually burying five of his seven three point attempts.

So that brings us to the end of Steve Wojciechowski's first season at the helm of Marquette basketball.  That means it's also the end of the collegiate careers of Juan Anderson, Matt Carlino, and Derrick Wilson.  Carlino played a major role in keeping this team afloat on the offensive end in his one season in Milwaukee after graduating from BYU.  Anderson and Wilson had much better starts to their stint in blue and gold, appearing in a Sweet 16 as freshmen and an Elite 8 as sophomores, not to mention winning Big East regular season titles in each of their first two seasons.  It hasn't been great for the team over the last two seasons, but I believe we've seen the absolute best effort from both Anderson and Wilson over that run as they did their damndest to will the Golden Eagles to the best possible performance that they could manage.  THANK YOU to Matt, Juan, and Derrick, for everything that you've done for Marquette basketball over the last four years.

With that, then, this is your post-season dejection thread.  Only 246 days until the Henry Ellenson era begins.