Marquette’s path to Detroit compromised

Any chance of an appearance in Detroit by the Marquette Golden Eagles went down in flames last night. Remember Dominic James, the physical but tiny point guard who contemplated going pro after his freshmen year, well, he’s now almost assuredly out for the rest of the season after suffering a broken left foot in the first half of the Eagles loss at home to UConn. The senior is averaging almost 12 ppg and over 5 assists/gm, but more importantly, is Marquette’s undeniable floor leader.

Marquette is a thin team with James, they become extremely vulnerable without him. His replacement is junior Maurice Acker, a guy who has seen a drop off in playing time since last season, where he averaged 4.5ppg and shot 43% from downtown in 13min/gm. This year he’s seeing the floor almost two minutes less and predictably his production has suffered.

Senior Jerel McNeal (4 assists/gm) will have to handle the ball a lot more, not necessarily a bad thing, but with Marquette’s other weapons (Hayward, Matthews) at their disposal, Marquette can still cause problems for teams. But losing your solid as a rock floor leader, essentially their all-league catcher, right before tourney time begins is as about as deflating as it can get. However, depending on their NCAA tourney draw, we could still see Marquette come the Elite Eight. What is just devastating about this is the fact James stuck around all four years and give his heart and soul to the program, and to have his career end like this is just unreal.

But you know what, maybe Maurice Acker takes a hold of this opportunity and makes a name for himself. It would be quite a story.

Consider me on board the Marquette bandwagon.