2010 Big East Basketball Tournament: Georgetown vs Marquette

Is there really anything else that needs to be said when the good Georgetown Hoyas show up on a basketball court? The Marquette Golden Eagles learned on Friday night that when a Jekyll-and-Hyde team decides to display its better side, few opponents in the world of college basketball can ever keep up with the dynamos from Washington, D.C.

It's been a terrific and transformative week in New York City for the No. 8 seed at the Big East Tournament. A Georgetown squad that has conceded so many puzzling defeats this season to inferior opponents, and which has displayed erratic basketball behavior (not personal behavior, one hastens to add) throughout the course of the 2009-2010 season, has finally managed to string together a series of top-shelf games. Just 31 hours after running top-seeded Syracuse out of Madison Square Garden, the Georgetown kids created more "Hoya Paranoia" in the hearts of their foes by eviscerating the Marquette Golden Eagles in the first Big East semifinal of the evening.

The win not only gives coach John Thompson III a chance to win Georgetown's eighth Big East Tournament championship on Saturday night against West Virginia; it represents yet another quality win which will boost the Hoyas' seeding in the upcoming NCAA Tournament. If GU entered New York with a 9 seed in its future, the Hoyas have now earned at least a 6 seed for March Madness, with the possibility of going one or two notches higher if they can max out once more against the Mountaineers.

If GU does indeed max out against anyone - even Kansas - this team has a good chance of winning. Just ask coach Buzz Williams and his men of Marquette.

Georgetown rolled to a 15-4 lead in the first five minutes, dominating play and suggesting that this game would not be very competitive at all. Marquette, however, knows how to compete; the Golden Eagles - genetically conditioned, it seems, to play close games this season - tied the score at 30 late in the first half and continuously made a charge at the lead each time Georgetown tried to run away and hide with the proceedings in the game's first 29 minutes. When MU uncorked a 10-0 run to cut a 48-37 Hoya advantage to 48-47 with 13:34 left, the crowd inside The World's Most Famous Arena developed a sense that the Golden Eagles would maintain contact with the Hoyas for the duration of an entertaining and relatively fast-paced competition.

In the stretch run of this showdown, that notion bit the dust, as the Big East Tournament's most successful school forcefully flexed its muscles, particularly in the form of Greg Monroe.

If there's a more versatile big man in the country, a Federal investigation needs to be conducted in the nation's capital, because Washington, D.C., is the current residence of Greg Monroe, a 6-11 sensation who landed Marquette on the canvas with a dazzling display midway in the latter stages of the second half. With 8:53 remaining and GU up by a 60-51 score, Monroe blocked a shot by MU star Lazar Hayward. Three possessions later, he dunked at the end of a beautiful halfcourt sequence, and on the following possession - feeling full of himself, as any flourishing player should - Monroe buried a 3-pointer from the left sideline in front of a giddy Georgetown bench. By the time this all-around whirlwind was done messing around with Marquette, Monroe totaled 23 points, 13 rebounds, seven assists, and two blocks. Monroe was the driving force in a game-ending 24-6 run by the Hoyas in the final 11 minutes of play. Up only five, at 56-51, with 10:52 remaining, GU turned on the afterburners and left the Golden Eagles in the dust.

That's what the good Georgetown can do, with Greg Monroe leading the way.

WHAT’S NEXT

Georgetown will take on third-seeded West Virginia for the Big East Tournament title on Saturday night at the Garden. The game key really isn't anything specific; it doesn't need to be with the Hoyas. If their best selves reappear on the court, they're quite likely to win. If a series of four games in four days has their legs tired and winds up sabotaging their focus, they'll probably settle for a runner-up finish and a decent seed in the NCAA Tournament. Win or lose, it's been a very successful and highly encouraging tournament for Georgetown. The Hoyas know that the form they've shown in New York needs to be bottled up so it can be unleashed one week from now in the NCAAs.

Big East Tournament - Semifinal No. 1

WHAT’S NEXT