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Message: [QUOTE="RuffRuff, post: 5163524, member: 1268"] Marquette will be interesting - they are soft as butter down low with Gold at the 5 and Joplin at the 4. Their guard play, especially defensively, is outstanding with Jones/Ross/Mitchell. Mitchell is shooting the 3 at 42% so far this year after being a career 29% kind of kid, so that's likely to level off. Once again, a roster without a lot of oomph down low, that can't rebound well and thrives on perimeter pressure & turning the ball over. This generally feels like the same script year over year for them, which hasn't resulted in much in terms of sustainable March runs. All it will take is running into a team with ball handlers and beef down low to slow it down and muscle them around. They're not all that deep, although Shaka seems to have worked the bench in incrementally. Can this team sustain the balls to the wall defense focused on pressure and turnovers, especially with marginal depth, or will it hit its March wall again? Jones is a special player, so they do have that. I think you're discounting Gtown a bit - they're around the 315th youngest roster in the country and will only improve with the season. Sorber is lottery pick material, Mack & Epps are good players. I don't think we get out of Nova/Gtown/Xavier away unscathed, without Liam. [/QUOTE]