By Paul Imig
FOXSportsWisconsin.com
March 9, 2011
On the opening night of a potential five-day trip to New York, Marquette may have unofficially punched its ticket to the NCAA tournament.
A 17-0 run to start the game led the Golden Eagles to an 87-66 win over the Big East tournament's 14th-seeded Providence Friars.
Senior forward Jimmy Butler nearly had a triple-double, finishing with 19 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists.
"It's a brand new season and anything can happen," Butler said after the game. "If we continue to fight and continue to play D, guard, get back in transition, we could be in New York for a while."
Butler's performance continued his recent streak of impressive play after combining to score 50 points in Marquette's previous two games.
"I feel like I've been playing like this way the entire year," Butler said. "I've been much more aggressive on the offensive end, but I think when it comes to the defensive end that's what starts everything for me and that's what starts everything for my teammates.� So when we are guarding, it will look like I'm playing a lot better."
Providence was unable to overcome the early 17-point deficit and never got any closer than seven.
The nation's second-highest scorer, Marshon Brooks, was held in check for the second consecutive game against the Golden Eagles. In the previous meeting on Feb. 27, Brooks scored 17. In Tuesday night's rematch, it took the Friars' senior 18 shots to score 20 points, still nearly five points less than his average.
Marquette had lost two in a row heading into the Big East tournament and may have needed this win over Providence heading into the selection committee's bracket unveiling on Sunday.
Only 21 hours after leaving the court at Madison Square Garden, the Golden Eagles will be back to take on West Virginia in the second round.
One word continued to come up as Butler and teammate Darius Johnson-Odom talked about the upcoming matchup with the Mountaineers: "fight."
"That thing is going to be a fight," Butler said. "The toughest team is going to win. They're just like us in many ways, so we have to prepare like we prepare for any other game and go out there and make it a dog fight."
Johnson-Odom scored 23 points against the Friars in his first game after being named to the All-Big East second team. The junior guard scored 21 in a win over West Virginia on New Year's Day in Marquette's first conference game of the season.
"It's going to be a fight," he said. "It's going to come down to a one possession game. I think it's going to take a lot of fight, a lot of hard work, a lot mentally for us to come out and win that game. And we've got to be mentally prepared.� I think we've got to come out and fight."
Buzz Williams was happy with team's "extremely high" energy level against Providence and believes it will take a similar effort to continue advancing in the tournament.
"I think they play incredibly hard," the Golden Eagles head coach said about the Mountaineers. "They're the hardest playing team in the country, you could argue.� They won't beat themselves. You're going to have to beat them.
"They're just fundamentally sound and they want to turn it into a slug fest. I just think that's how coach (Bob) Huggins coaches and that's how he recruits and I think his players take on the personality of him."
With another win in the tournament, Marquette would then face Louisville on Thursday night. On Jan. 15, the Golden Eagles had an 18-point lead on the road against the Cardinals with less than six minutes remaining. However, a 24-5 run to close out the game completed the comeback for the Cardinals as Louisville went on to a 12-6 conference record and the No. 3 seed in the Big East tournament.
