Until Sunday's 93-63 dismantling of Providence, any discussion of numbers with regard to the Marquette Golden Eagles tended to revolve around their three losses by a combined five points to West Virginia and Villanova.
Heading into Wednesday night's game at DePaul, though, the focus has shifted to a far more positive statistic. Entering the week, the Golden Eagles (11-6 overall, 2-3 Big East) ranked No. 1 nationally in three-point accuracy at 43.4% (139 for 320).
They've been even better in league play from beyond the arc, knocking their threes down at a remarkable 48.2% clip (53 for 110) to lead the 16-team Big East and, more important, help mitigate their lack of size and depth against more talented teams.
"I definitely have a strong belief in numbers - if you study them in an objective way," said coach Buzz Williams. "We have never mentioned a specific number of threes, or what our percentage has been recently. However, we constantly stress paint touches and creating for others. We believe the combination of those two things will typically turn into a good shot for our team."
What's been most interesting about how MU has been hitting from deep is it didn't necessarily project as a strong three-point shooting team coming into the season.
The Golden Eagles really had only one established three-point shooter in senior forward Lazar Hayward, who canned a career-best 53 last season. Senior guards Maurice Acker and David Cubillan had their moments in previous seasons, but nothing to suggest they'd suddenly break out and find the range.
But through 17 games, MU has six players with at least 10 threes. Hayward has rebounded from a rough start to hit 28, while Acker and Cubillan each have 24. Both have had games in Big East play in which they've gone 6 for 6 - Acker against Providence on Sunday and Cubillan against Georgetown on Jan. 6.
Acker, who's 10 for 13 from three-point range in Big East play, actually leads the league in accuracy at 76.9%.
Even Jimmy Butler - he of the 0-for-4 sophomore season from three - has gotten in on the act, hitting 10 of 17 to pace the Golden Eagles at 58.8%.
The real story, though, has been the addition of Darius Johnson-Odom. The sophomore guard transferred to MU from Hutchinson (Kan.) Community College, where he averaged 21.6 points and scored a school-record 46 points in a game last season.
Shuttling between the bench and starting lineup and using an incredibly effective shot-fake that keeps defenders off-balance, the 6-foot-2 Johnson-Odom leads the Golden Eagles with 39 threes and the Big East in three-point accuracy in overall games at 53.4% (39 for 73).
He displayed his quick-strike capabilities in the first half of the Providence game, when he hit 4 threes in a 7 1/2-minute span to help stake MU to a 45-29 lead. He went into halftime with 20 points - two better than his previous career high.
"I think it was just my energy," said the left-handed Johnson-Odom, whose 12.2 points per game rank him third on MU behind Hayward's 18.8 and Butler's 15.2.
"Not playing for a week and our last game being a loss, you just want to come out with a lot of energy. We had a lot of passion and a lot of emotion. We just wanted to come out and show everybody what we can do."
The Golden Eagles have been getting loads of open shots from three-point range thanks to the drive-and-kick approach Williams embraces. Getting into the paint collapses defenses, which in turn leads to better looks.
And while an occasional bad shooting night is unavoidable, it's still an approach MU is going to need to continue to excel at in order to keep itself in the hunt in the Big East.
"Because our margin for error is so small, we want to have consecutive perfect possessions on offense, and we want to have consecutive stops on defense. A lot of our number jargon that we use with our team is related to that," Williams said.
"I'm not sure if we have a team full of shooters, but I think we have developed into a team that understands the foundation of a good shot."
Until Sunday's 93-63 dismantling of Providence, any discussion of numbers with regard to the Marquette Golden Eagles tended to revolve around their three losses by a combined five points to West Virginia and Villanova.
Heading into Wednesday night's game at DePaul, though, the focus has shifted to a far more positive statistic. Entering the week, the Golden Eagles (11-6 overall, 2-3 Big East) ranked No. 1 nationally in three-point accuracy at 43.4% (139 for 320).
They've been even better in league play from beyond the arc, knocking their threes down at a remarkable 48.2% clip (53 for 110) to lead the 16-team Big East and, more important, help mitigate their lack of size and depth against more talented teams.
"I definitely have a strong belief in numbers - if you study them in an objective way," said coach Buzz Williams. "We have never mentioned a specific number of threes, or what our percentage has been recently. However, we constantly stress paint touches and creating for others. We believe the combination of those two things will typically turn into a good shot for our team."
What's been most interesting about how MU has been hitting from deep is it didn't necessarily project as a strong three-point shooting team coming into the season.
The Golden Eagles really had only one established three-point shooter in senior forward Lazar Hayward, who canned a career-best 53 last season. Senior guards Maurice Acker and David Cubillan had their moments in previous seasons, but nothing to suggest they'd suddenly break out and find the range.
But through 17 games, MU has six players with at least 10 threes. Hayward has rebounded from a rough start to hit 28, while Acker and Cubillan each have 24. Both have had games in Big East play in which they've gone 6 for 6 - Acker against Providence on Sunday and Cubillan against Georgetown on Jan. 6.
Acker, who's 10 for 13 from three-point range in Big East play, actually leads the league in accuracy at 76.9%.
Even Jimmy Butler - he of the 0-for-4 sophomore season from three - has gotten in on the act, hitting 10 of 17 to pace the Golden Eagles at 58.8%.
The real story, though, has been the addition of Darius Johnson-Odom. The sophomore guard transferred to MU from Hutchinson (Kan.) Community College, where he averaged 21.6 points and scored a school-record 46 points in a game last season.
Shuttling between the bench and starting lineup and using an incredibly effective shot-fake that keeps defenders off-balance, the 6-foot-2 Johnson-Odom leads the Golden Eagles with 39 threes and the Big East in three-point accuracy in overall games at 53.4% (39 for 73).
He displayed his quick-strike capabilities in the first half of the Providence game, when he hit 4 threes in a 7 1/2-minute span to help stake MU to a 45-29 lead. He went into halftime with 20 points - two better than his previous career high.
"I think it was just my energy," said the left-handed Johnson-Odom, whose 12.2 points per game rank him third on MU behind Hayward's 18.8 and Butler's 15.2.
"Not playing for a week and our last game being a loss, you just want to come out with a lot of energy. We had a lot of passion and a lot of emotion. We just wanted to come out and show everybody what we can do."
The Golden Eagles have been getting loads of open shots from three-point range thanks to the drive-and-kick approach Williams embraces. Getting into the paint collapses defenses, which in turn leads to better looks.
And while an occasional bad shooting night is unavoidable, it's still an approach MU is going to need to continue to excel at in order to keep itself in the hunt in the Big East.
"Because our margin for error is so small, we want to have consecutive perfect possessions on offense, and we want to have consecutive stops on defense. A lot of our number jargon that we use with our team is related to that," Williams said.
"I'm not sure if we have a team full of shooters, but I think we have developed into a team that understands the foundation of a good shot."
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