Marquette Golden Eagles (18-11, 7-9) vs Georgetown Hoyas (14-15, 7-9)
Marquette Stat Leaders
Points: Henry Ellenson, 16.6 ppg
Rebounds: Henry Ellenson, 9.8 rpg
Assists: Traci Carter, 4.6 apg
Marquette Injury Update: Matt Heldt sat out his second straight game last Saturday due to a knee injury. I don't expect we'll see him tonight. Sandy Cohen returned to action against Villanova after being suspended for the Creighton game.
Georgetown Stat Leaders
Points: D`Vauntes Smith-Rivera, 16.6 ppg
Rebounds: Bradley Hayes, 6.6 rpg
Assists: D`Vauntes Smith-Rivera, 4.4 apg
Georgetown Injury Update: Bradley Hayes has missed the last four games with a broken hand. I wouldn't expect him to play here, or the rest of the season at this point. After Hayes, Georgetown's next best rebounder is Isaac Copeland, who averages 5.0 per game.
Current KenPom Rankings
Marquette: #96
Georgetown: #76
KenPom Predictions: Marquette has a 62% chance of victory, with a predicted score of 73-70.
Since We Last Met: Nearly the whole damn league schedule happened. MU & Georgetown hooked up in DC for the second game of the league schedule back on January 2nd. Both teams have played 14 games since then, and things have gone slightly better for Marquette. Georgetown opened up league play with two wins, but they've gone 5-9 since then, thus not redeeming themselves for their ugly non-conference losses. Marquette opened with two losses, but that means they've gone 7-7 since losing to the Hoyas.
What Happened Last Time: Marquette went 5-10 from long range and lost 80-70, largely because Luke Fischer & Henry Ellenson went 8-26 combined. It got out of control early as the Hoyas went up 13 and then led by as many as 19 in the second half, but MU made it interesting by cutting it to six with 2:40 remaining.
Marquette Last 10 Games: 6-4, with the loss to #1 Villanova snapping a two game winning streak.
Georgetown Last 10 Games: 2-8, with four straight losses. St. John's is their only win in their last eight games.
All Time Series: Georgetown leads, 11-9.
Current Streak: Georgetown has won three straight against Marquette.
Henry Ellenson Watch: Let's start with the freshman records Ellenson has either already broken or has no chance to break: He has the free throws made (114) & free throws attempted (154) records, and his 45 blocks are second best to Jim McIlvaine's 92. Ellenson is now Marquette's all time leading freshman rebounder with 279, surpassing Bo Ellis' record of 264. We can't forget that with 13 points against Villanova, Ellenson became Marquette's leading freshman scorer, with his 481 points eclipsing Dominic James' previous record of 473.
His 167 field goals made tied with Bo Ellis for third most by a freshmen; his 382 field goal attempts are 2nd most, trailing only Dominic James at 404.
Traci Carter Watch: Carter's 134 helpers are the third most assists by a freshman in Marquette history. This is a big deal, because he has essentially no shot at getting to second place (Dominic James, 167), much less the freshman record (Tony Miller, 221). He has the fourth most steals by a freshman with 45, and he needs five more to tie Dominic James for third.
Luke Fischer Watch: The junior from Germantown has the fifth most blocks for a Marquette junior at 46, and his next block will tie Dwayne (Not The Rock) Johnson in fourth place. He's just nine blocks away from moving into the top 10 in a season all time, by the way.
Haanif Cheatham Watch: Cheatham has moved up to the third most free throws made by a freshman and the sixth most freshman free throw attempts. I feel like this is largely being overlooked due to Henry Ellenson already breaking both of those records. He does have a shot at breaking the freshman record for free throw percentage, as he's currently shooting 80.2% and Damon Key's record is 81.6%. Cheatham has 343 points on the season, tying him with Jerel McNeal for seventh most by a Marquette freshman. Bo Ellis is up next at 378 points. Cheatham is now tied for the 10th most made field goals by a freshman, but he's still 30 FGAs away from that top 10. In case you're wondering, he's in the middle of the pack for the top 10 for freshman field goal percentage, but that fluctuates from game to game. He needs two made threes to tie Anthony Pieper for the 10th most by a freshman, and his three point percentage of 43.1% trails only Travis Diener and Steve Novak amongst freshmen. Cheatham needs three assists to move into the freshman top 10 in that category, and five more steals for the freshman top 10 there.
Duane Wilson Watch: Wilson's worked himself up to the ninth most made three pointers amongst Marquette sophomores, sitting just three more than Tony Miller (46) and one fewer than Dominic James (50). His 145 three point attempts rank as the eighth most for Marquette sophomores as there's a huge gap between Darius Johnson-Odom (154) and David Cubillan (116).
Follow Along On Twitter
@MarquetteMBB - Official Marquette account
@GeorgetownHoops - Official Georgetown account
@AnonymousEagle - Hey, that's us!
@CasualHoya - SB Nation's Georgetown site
@becb_sbn - SB Nation's Big East site
@Matt_Velazquez - The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel MU beat reporter