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The Big East women’s basketball regular season wrapped up on Sunday, and with the conclusion of those games, the 2019 conference tournament bracket is officially set!
Here’s what it looks like!
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Let’s focus on the important issues for Marquette, the outright regular season champions and #1 seed. St. John’s and Seton Hall will face off on Saturday, March 9th, with the winner advancing to the quarterfinals on Sunday to play Marquette. The winner of the quarterfinal round will get either Villanova or Georgetown in the semifinals.
Marquette has advanced to each of the last two championship games. They won the tournament in 2017 after not winning the regular season title, and then lost in the title game in 2018 after securing a share of the regular season title. Both times it was DePaul standing in the way on the other side of the title game, and this year sets up to end up there again. The Blue Demons are the #2 seed, and thus you’d expect them to reach the title game, especially with the tournament being played at Wintrust Arena in Chicago.
There are questions about whether or not Marquette can reach the title game. Erika Davenport is done for the season after a knee injury during MU’s final home weekend of games. Danielle King suffered some sort of injury during the final weekend of the regular season and missed the final game of the season. She appears to be mostly healthy, though, but with Marquette having to play three games in three days in order to win a tournament title, it’s completely up in the air as to how much that King would be available.
Here’s the official rundown on the times and schedules for the tournament. All times Central.
First Round – March 9
Game 1: #9 St. John’s vs. #8 Seton Hall, 2 p.m. (BEDN)
Game 2: #10 Xavier vs. #7 Providence, 4:30 p.m. (BEDN)
Quarterfinals – March 10
Game 3: #1 Marquette vs Game 1 winner, Noon (FS2)
Game 4: #5 Villanova vs. #4 Georgetown, 2:30 p.m. (FS2)
Game 5: #2 DePaul vs. Game 2 winner, 6 p.m. (FS2)
Game 6: #6 Creighton vs. #3 Butler, 8:30 p.m. (FS2)
Semifinals – March 11
Game 7: Game 3 winner vs. Game 4 winner, 3 p.m. (FS1)
Game 8: Game 5 winner vs. Game 6 winner, 5:30 p.m. (FS1)
Final – March 12
Game 9: Semifinal winners, 7 p.m. (FS1)