It's a strange, almost eerie feeling to walk into the Marquette gym sans the sight of Jerel McNeal, Dominic James and Wesley Matthews.
The three guards were a fixture at the school since the day they arrived on campus back in 2005.
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They were Marquette basketball.
But just as the Golden Eagles have turned the page on the Tom Crean era, the program is also moving on from its version of the Big Three.
Now it's Lazar Hayward and a bunch of anonymous faces.
Well, I know a few of them — such as talented combo guard Darius Johnson-Odom, who starred at Patterson School and more recently at Hutchinson Community College, and freshman point guard Junior Cadougan.
But as far as the nation is concerned, this is a team of anonymity.
Even Hayward is far from a household name despite finishing in the Big East's top 10 in both scoring (16.3) and rebounding (8.6) a year ago.
There's no way you've heard of freshman Jeronne Maymon unless you're a recruiting junkie or a native of Wisconsin, where the 6-foot-6 forward won Mr. Basketball.
Dwight Buycks was a big-time junior college guard at Indian Hills who scored more than 1,200 points in two seasons, but no one gets any pub in the JUCO ranks these days.
