The energy was ever present in the Al McGuire Center before the game even started as Marquette women’s basketball (21-7, 10-7 Big East) honored its five seniors for Senior Day.
But in the end, the Golden Eagles didn’t have enough energy to beat the St. John’s Red Storm, ending in a 56-50 loss Tuesday night.
Here are three takeaways from the defeat:
Golden Eagles’ offense couldn’t get the job done
Marquette looked a step behind St. John’s offensively all night, and trailed at halftime, 30-27, for just the sixth time this season.
“In the first half, we had some great cuts and opportunities,” Marquette head coach Megan Duffy said. “We just missed some few, a few easy baskets.”
The Golden Eagles then never held a lead in the second half and couldn’t complete the comeback. They shot a season-low 29.7% from the field and 22.7% from beyond the arc.
“Just got to find a different way to win,” senior guard Jordan King said.
Marquette fell victim to scoring droughts
The Golden Eagles scored only eight points in the entire third quarter. Six of those eight came in the final minute of the frame.
Senior forward Liza Karlen got a basket at the start of the second half, but for the nine minutes following that make, it was crickets for Marquette’s offense.
The Golden Eagles shot 0-for-10 and 0-for-3 from deep during the near-quarter-long drought, and 3-for-16 overall in the period.
“We’ve always been a team that’s been able to find ways to win when that happens,” King said. “So whether that’s on the defensive end, rebounding, and those are just a couple areas that I thought we could have been better at.”
Seniors led Marquette in scoring
Only two Golden Eagles finished with double-digit points: King and Karlen.
Karlen put up the most points on Marquette (15) and King was right behind with 14.
But the rest of the seniors have also played an important role this season, each shining in their own roles8
Duffy said that in the future, she and the rest of coaching staff need to help them out.
“Those five [seniors] mean the world to me and our staff,” Duffy said. “We [coaches] got to figure out how to be better for them and put them in some easier situations.”
This article was written by Raquel Ruiz. She can be reached at raquel.ruiz@marquette.edu or on Twitter/X @RaquelRuizMU.