MU hosts Chicago State

Game two of the Buzz Williams era tips off tonight at 7pm when the Marquette Golden Eagles take on the Chicago State Cougars (1-0) at the Bradley Center.

Tonight's game kicks off the 2008 Chicago Invitational, which includes two home games for Marquette. The Golden Eagles will host Texas Southern on November 25 before playing a pair of games at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates, Ill., on November 28-29.

Marquette (1-0) topped Houston Baptist 95-64 to open the season. Wesley Matthews led Marquette with 27 points. Despite the blowout win, Dwight Burke's ineffective performance was the game's most noteworthy development. The 6'8 senior fouled out after just 13 minutes of action, failing to attempt a shot and grabbing only a pair of rebounds. Sophomore Pat Hazel picked up his veteran teammate, contributing seven points and four boards in 22 minutes of action.

As a preview for tonight's game, Rosiak previews the game here. The focus of the article is how the team is short players and the challenges that it creates. After all, the team doesn't even field enough for a five on five full court game right now. However, it's been nice to see that Buzz isn't using this as an excuse.

In addition, Rosiak blogs additional game notes for tonight's tilt. Some interesting things from that game. Chicago State scored 112 points in their first game, which is a lot of points even if you are playing NAIA school St. Xavier University. Also, if you read further, you'll see that Chicago State returns twelve players and they start four seniors. Plus, Buzz says:

last year 39.6% of their field goal attempts they followed with an offensive rebound, which is a phenomenal statistic

Chicago State must be an offensive juggernaut. Of course, Rob would like to remind everyone that Chicago State was the #273 Pomeroy team in the nation last year too. Marquette was #11. And the Pomeroy statistics say that their Offensive Rebounding Percentage (OR%) was only 31.5%. Unlike the 39.6% from Buzz, 31.5% on OR% is not so good, so there needs to be some reconciliation here.

MEDIA UPDATES

• Marquette games notes
  
• CBS Sportsline previews the game

More to come........As an aside, late last week Michael Snaer selected FSU over MU and Kansas. Snaer would have been a marquee recruit for sure, but it wasn't a surprise when he didn't pick Marquette.

*This preview is a joint post by Tim Blair and Rob Lowe.