Back on Wednesday morning, Eric “Balky” Balkman asked me a Big East projections reset question during my weekly appearance on The Show on The Score. In the preseason, I said that I thought that Marquette was a better team than the one that the Big East coaches picked to finish fifth. His question was 1) Do I still think that and 2) Is Marquette actually capable of finishing fifth as projected?
The answers are 1) No, and 2) at the time, I thought yes. That’s partially because two teams picked in front
of Marquette — Creighton and Providence — have not lived up to expectations either. The catch, of course, is that Villanova, Xavier, Butler, and Seton Hall, all picked behind Marquette, have looked better than their spot in the preseason poll and better than MU in particular. Two ahead move back, four behind move forward…. generally speaking, that’s bad math for Marquette getting to fifth place.
Balky’s follow up question, after watching Marquette go 0-6 in non-conference play against teams that roughly work out to equivalent to Big East opponents, was this: Can Marquette get to 10-10 in the 20 game conference slate?
My answer was, on Wednesday morning, with 20 Big East games left to be played: Yes, they can.
It requires winning home games you can win and winning road games against the lesser teams in the league…. because beating UConn and St. John’s at home is going to be very hard for this Golden Eagles team.
And then, 8 hours after I said that on The Score, on live radio for everyone to hear, on permanently recorded podcast form for everyone to go back and listen in retrospect, Marquette blew a nine point first half lead against Georgetown, ended up trailing by as many as 15 in the second half, and lost by nine, 78-69.
0-1 in the Big East, 0-7 against Big East or Big East-type opponents on the year. 19 regular season games left to go to get to 10-10 in the league…. and to go one step further than Balky’s question, left to get to one game over .500 overall to go into the Big East tournament with a guarantee of avoiding a losing season.
And so, we’re going to do a live updating feature right here. I’m going to circle back after every Marquette men’s basketball game and adjust everything from this point in the article downwards to keep track of exactly what MU has to do to get to at least 10-10 in the Big East, and at least 16-15 overall to guarantee a .500 record or better regardless of what happens in the Big East tournament.
So, y’know, bookmark this page for quick reference down the road.
This is Marquette’s remaining schedule, broken down by just home and away:
Home
Butler, Connecticut, Creighton, DePaul, Providence, St. John’s, Seton Hall, Villanova, Xavier
Away
Butler, Connecticut, Creighton, DePaul, Georgetown, Providence, St. John’s, Seton Hall, Villanova, Xavier
Marquette has to go 10-9 in those games to get to 10-10 in the Big East.
Marquette has to go 11-8 in those games to guarantee a .500 or better record overall.
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