Marquette women’s basketball (16-4, 5-4 Big East) snapped its two-game losing streak against Butler Saturday afternoon at the Al McGuire Center, defeating the Bulldogs 59-48.
Here are three takeaways from the Golden Eagles win:
Dominant third quarter
The Golden Eagles trailed 31-25 heading into the locker room, knowing that the way they played in the second quarter wasn’t going to be enough to win this game.
“I feel like it always gets back to our defense,” senior forward Liza Karlen said. “We obviously had a dry spurt in the first half of missing outside shots but that’s never really a big concern for us. It always comes back to the defense.”
Whatever was said or done in that halftime meeting worked, as the Golden Eagles would go on to dominate the Bulldogs in the period, outscoring them 23-8.
Marquette shot 56% from the field, compared to the 27% that it forced Butler to shoot
Hare keeps scoring
Sophomore guard Kenzie Hare has been somewhat of a revelation this season for the Golden Eagles.
After only averaging 7.2 points per game in her first season, Hare has seen her role in the offense grow significantly this season. The Naperville, Illinois native is second on the team in scoring, averaging 15.2 points per game. Saturday afternoon was no different, as Hare scored 19 points while going 4-for-8 from deep.
“You’re seeing her game evolve with her pull up game, she hit the one late, she’s getting downhill and then obviously, her three is very good,” head coach Megan Duffy said. “The more she’s out on the court, and the more she’s in those positions to be successful as a sophomore, the better the situations will be for her.”
Starters shoulder the load
All five of Marquette’s starters in Saturday’s game played at least 30 minutes. This included graduate student forward Frannie Hottinger, who re-entered the starting lineup after a brief four-game absence from it.
Only the five starters saw the ball go through the hoop as the bench put up zero points for the first time this season.
Some of this could be due to the fact that 34 of the 58 shots attempted by the Golden Eagles were from Karlen and Hare. However, it could also be a result of the fact that the bench just wasn’t shooting the ball.
Of the four shot attempts taken by a bench player on Saturday, none of them fell. First-year forward Skylar Forbes went 0-for-3, and junior forward Abby Cracknell missed the only shot she took on the afternoon as well.
Even though Marquette was able to pull out the win against Butler, more bench production would be very beneficial for the Golden Eagles as they enter the final months of the season.
This story was written by Matthew Baltz. He can be reached at matthew.baltz@marquette.edu or on Twitter/X @MatthewBaltzMU.