It appears that the Marquette Golden Eagles have done exactly what sophomore center Luke Fischer said last Saturday they could not do: they have allowed team morale to drop. The Golden Eagles put in a thoroughly uninspired performance on Wednesday night as they fell at the hands of the Villanova Wildcats by a score of 70-52.
Villanova was led by an 18 point performance from Ryan Arcidicanono, 12 points from Darrun Hilliard, a strong nine rebound performance from Daniel Ochefu and a 10 point, seven rebound performance from JayVaugh Pinkston. Marquette's season leading scorer Matt Carlino was held to just nine points, and they had only one player in double figures as Jajuan Johnson led the Golden Eagles with 10.
The game itself was never really a contest. In spite of Villanova opening the night playing like a team at the bottom of the Patriot League while committing five turnovers on their opening seven possessions, Marquette was unable to capitalize. The Golden Eagles opened up a 6-2 lead, but proceeded to go without scoring over the next seven game minutes, which encompassed seven possessions.
By the time Marquette woke up, Villanova had a 12-6 lead. Back-to-back three-pointers from Carlino quickly tied the game but Marquette would never make it any closer than that. Villanova ripped off a 12-0 run, and held a 36-16 before a Carlino three at the buzzer made it a marginally more respectable halftime deficit.
The Wildcats came out from the halftime break looking ever stronger, and their lead peaked at 50-26 after a powerful dunk from Dylan Ellis, and from that point on the game truly was over. The last 12 minutes took on an air of garbage time, and really were garbage time.
However, Marquette coach Steve Wojciechowski may be more worried about the health of Carlino than about the play of his team. The man who transferred in from BYU has been electric all season, and he took a hard fall and a blow to his head in the second half. From that point on, Carlino had little to no impact and the Golden Eagles slumped to a disappointing 70-52 defeat.
Villanova improves to 20-2 (7-2 Big East) and they will host Georgetown on Saturday. Meanwhile, Marquette have now lost six straight and they drop to 10-12 (2-8 Big East). The Golden Eagles will travel to Seton Hall on Saturday.