In the opening game of this year’s Big East Tournament, Georgetown rode a strong defensive performance to easily defeat the Marquette Golden Eagles 68-49 at Madison Square Garden. This marks Patrick Ewing’s first Big East Tournament victory as a coach.
The Hoyas were led by Javhon Blair, who scored a game high 20 points in 29 minutes after coming off the bench for the fourth consecutive game. Although Blair did not start, he gave Georgetown an offensive jolt after coming in which helped the Hoyas grab the lead, and they never turned back. Not far behind was center Qudus Wahab with an outstanding performance of 19 points along with 7 rebounds.
Coming into the game, one thing was clear for Georgetown: if they wanted to make this game competitive, they had to dominate the paint and the glass. To say they did a good job with both would be an understatement. Both Qudus Wahab and Timothy Ighoefe did their jobs on both sides of the ball, combining for 23 points while helping the Hoyas maintain a presence on the glass. In the end, Georgetown outrebounded Marquette 46-32 with the most apparent difference being on the offensive glass, where they outdid the Golden Eagles 16-7.
To make the Hoyas’ lives a little easier, Marquette was not able to utilize their two standout bigs, Dawson Garcia and Theo John, to their full potential due to early foul trouble for Garcia and an injury to John. This forced freshman Justin Lewis, who has only seen limited minutes this season due to injury, to step into a much larger role during this game. The extended absences of Garcia and John was most definitely felt as it forced Marquette to look for points elsewhere and ultimately led to a rather inefficient day from the floor, as the Golden Eagles shot 36% from the field and 21% from deep.
At the same time, the Hoyas did not play their best offensive game, only shooting 39% from the field and 21% from deep. While Blair and Wahab were able to meaningfully contribute to the offense, the rest of Georgetown’s main contributors were relatively quiet. Aside from a couple good drives from Jamorko Pickett and a deep three from Chudier Bile, they were held to only eight and five points, respectively. But even though the Hoyas did not have their prettiest offensive game, they set themselves apart on defense, forcing 16 Marquette turnovers and allowing a season low 49 points. As Wahab put it after the game, “this is probably the best defensive game we’ve played.”
In the end, the Hoyas played one of their best all around games under Patrick Ewing. Ewing applauded the team, saying “it was a total team effort, everyone did something positive to help us win.” He even complimented the players who didn’t play, noting how supportive they were from the sidelines and how that mentality will help the program going forward.
Looking ahead, Georgetown matches up against the top-seeded Villanova Wildcats tomorrow afternoon in the second round of the Big East Tournament. In their previous two meetings this season, the Wildcats have gotten the better of the Hoyas, but that hasn’t been without a fight. The Hoyas will look to keep up their good play while exploiting Villanova’s lack of depth as a result of injuries to their top guards Collin Gillespie and Justin Moore. If they play like they did today, there is no telling how far these Hoyas could go in this tournament.
