As always, Ben Steele of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel spoke to Marquette men’s basketball head coach Shaka Smart after the Golden Eagles saved National Marquette Day with a 70-55 victory over Butler on Saturday. (Aside: Go subscribe to the JS to read Ben’s stuff on Marquette if nothing else. It’s worth it!) There were Bulldogs-related questions and answers of course, but MU’s top man had some things to say about redshirt junior guard Sean Jones, who missed his 10th straight game and 16th game of the season
on Saturday.
“He’s still dealing with turf toe,” MU head coach Shaka Smart said. “He’s a ways away. He’s not practicing yet.
“He’s not even done skill stuff, really, yet. I mean, he can do some stationary stuff and shooting. He’s not really moving around yet. Obviously we’re into February now, I think our last regular-season game is four weeks from today, so I don’t know for sure if and when he’ll be back. He’s working hard at the rehab process.”
So let’s just get right out and say it: Marquette head coach Shaka Smart is not sure that Sean Jones’ rehab and recovery timeline will work out to get the Ohio native on the floor for the Golden Eagles this season. “I don’t know for sure if he’ll be back.” It’s right there in black and white.
Smart said that on February 7th. Jones has not played since in the calendar year of 2026, with his last appearance coming on December 30th against Seton Hall, and the first game he missed coming on January 4th. Jones’ turf toe issues are such that have prevented him from practicing for just over five weeks right now. He’s only been out of a walking boot that immobilized his foot since around the home game against Providence on January 19th, and he’s still not able to practice nearly three weeks later and he’s not going to be able to practice soon.
That’s certainly not a reason for optimism to think that we’ll see Sean Jones on the court again between now and the regular season finale, which is four weeks from Saturday, just like Smart said it was. Here’s the other part of it: There’s no reason to hurry Jones back, either. Marquette’s next Big East loss will be their 10th, guaranteeing them no better than a 10-10 record in league play, and it will also be their 16th regular season loss, thus guaranteeing that the Golden Eagles will go into the Big East tournament with a losing record. The odds of Marquette making the NCAA tournament have been heading towards zero since they lost to Dayton, so it’s not like getting Jones back in the lineup is going to be helpful to bolster a postseason run for the Golden Eagles. Pretty much the best chance to see Jones play for Marquette again in 2025-26 is if Fox Sports needs teams to fill out their roster for The Crown event at the end of March, since that would give Jones an extra month to get right.
And that raises another question: Have we already seen the last of Sean Jones in a Marquette uniform?
Since Sean Jones stepped onto campus in the fall of 2022, Marquette has played 131 games. Jones has played in 57 of them. That’s less than 44% because he wrecked his knee mid-way through the 2023-24 season, missed all of 2024-25, and missed six games earlier this season with a shoulder issue before we got to the current foot issue. When he was available for Marquette this season, Jones never played more than the 24 minutes he logged against Southern in the second game of the season. By the time he returned from his shoulder injury, Nigel James had already done his best Lou Gehrig impression, turning Jones into Wally Pipp, the man who would never get his starting spot back.
Between this being Jones’ fourth year on campus, thus opening the door to the possibility that he graduates in May, and the fact that he will not be Marquette’s starting point guard ever again as long as Nigel James is in Milwaukee, and the fact that Jones is shooting just 32% from behind the three-point line and 30% inside of it this year, AND his now extensive injury history….. why should I expect to see him back in blue and gold in November 2026?
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