Get To Know A Marquette Basketball Opponent: IUPUI

Name: Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis

What? Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis

No, I Heard You The First Time, That Didn't Make It Make Sense: Oh, right. It's a joint venture between Indiana and Purdue, both of which are state funded schools in the state of Indiana, but it's still it's own school when it comes to sports, apparently.

How The Hell Did That Happen? In 1891, Indiana University started offering classes in Indianapolis, less than 60 miles northwest of the main campus in Bloomington. Eventually, IU placed their School Of Medicine and their School of Dentistry in Indianapolis for some idiot reason, along with the Robert H. McKinney School of Law, which is not to be confused with the Maurer School Of Law on the Bloomington campus. Along the way, Purdue wasn't taking any crap from Indiana, so they opened a satellite campus in Indianapolis, some 65 miles southeast of the main campus in West Lafayette.

In 1968, for reasons that generally speaking defy logic, Dr. Maynard K. Hine, the dean of the dental school, hammered out an agreement between the Indiana president, the Purdue president, and the mayor of Indianapolis to form a brand new school out of the bits of the two schools that were already in the city. Thus, IUPUI was born. IU is the managing partner of the school, though, so it's kind of like UWM being run by UW-Madison.

Enrollment: 30,690 (22,525 undergrad, 8,164 graduate)

Nickname: Jaguars

Why "Jaguars?" That's what they voted on when they moved to Division 1 in 1998. It appears that they used to be the Metros before that, which does seem infinitely more interesting.

Notable Alumni: Former Vice President Dan Quayle; Norman Bridwell, the creator of Clifford The Big Red Dog; and Indiana Pacers point guard George Hill.

A History Of Getting Boatraced: A yearly IUPUI tradition is the Regatta where teams of eight students, faculty, or alumni race canoes in the canal in downtown Indianpolis. The whole thing helps raise money for student scholarships.

Last Season: 13-19 overall, with a record of 9-7 in Summit League play.

This Season: 2-2, after a 83-71 win against Eastern Michigan on Saturday.

Final 2014-15 KenPom Ranking: #207

Current KenPom Ranking: #171

Stats Leaders

Points: Darell Combs, 17.5 ppg
Rebounds: Matt O’Leary & Evan Hall, 7.0 rpg
Assists: Darell Combs, 3.8 apg

Summit League Preseason Poll: IUPUI was picked to finish fifth in the nine team Summit League, although they did get one first place vote. Darell Combs was named to the preseason All-Summit League First Team.

Head Coach: Jason Gardner, in his third season both at IUPUI, and overall. He was formerly an assistant at Loyola-Chicago and Memphis, and before that, he was named Mr. Basketball in Indiana in 1999 before going on to be a star at Arizona. He has a career record of 25-42.

All Time Series: Marquette leads 3-0, with all three meetings coming in the last nine seasons.