Marquette takes down No

Nov 22, 2023, 01:38 AM ET

Steaming mad about some Kansas trash talk, Marquette coach Shaka Smart stormed up the sideline looking all set for a fight.His calm and collected players, nevertheless, were in complete control all night against the No. 1 group in the country.Oso Ighodaro

had 21 points and nine rebounds as No. 4 Marquette routed the top-ranked Jayhawks 73-59 on Tuesday in the Maui Invitational semifinals.With previous Marquette

great Dwyane Wade being in the front row, the early-season clash of national title competitors ended up being one-sided. The Golden Eagles (5-0) led for all but 22 seconds and were up by 17 with about seven minutes to play.Editor’s Picks Marquette will handle No. 2 Purdue for the tournament champion Wednesday (5 p.m. ET, ESPN). The Golden Eagles will be the first string given that Loyola Chicago in 1972 to play the Nos. 1 and 2 groups in the AP Top 25 on successive days and 10th total. The Ramblers are the only team to win both games, doing so in the 1963 NCAA tournament by beating No. 2 Duke on March 22 and No. 1 Cincinnati on March 23. Tempers flared in the first half after Kansas swingman Kevin McCullar Jr. drained a 3-pointer in front of Marquette’s bench. McCullar jawed at Smart as he headed back downcourt, and members of both groups had to be retreated from the heated dustup that followed.Both groups were offered technical fouls. A mad Smart and Jayhawks coach Bill Self appeared to exchange unpleasantries along the sideline at the end of the taking place conversation with authorities.”At the end of the day, it had extremely little to do with the game,”Smart stated. “Our guys did an actually good task of just essentially ignoring what occurred and simply continuing to play, and that shows their maturity and their grace. “Smart said he and McCullar are plenty knowledgeable about each other going back to when Smart was training Texas and McCullar played for Texas Tech.”

He’s always type of taken pleasure in having discussion with me– he most likely does that with all coaches– but that most likely began the dustup, and then their bench got involved and our bench got included,”Smart said.Ighodaro shot 9-of-15 from the field and scored 14 points in the 2nd half. Chase Ross included 12 points and 6 rebounds off the bench, and Kam Jones scored 10.” We felt like,

as a team, that this was a game that we had some benefits in, but we felt like it was actually, really essential to press those benefits by being linked, assisting each other, having a level of resolve even when things do not go our method, “Smart stated.”I thought our guys began the game with really, really excellent energy. Both teams were scoring, however then after about the very first six to 8 minutes, I believed we settled in defensively and that was the distinction in the game.”McCullar had 24 points and eight rebounds to speed the Jayhawks (4-1). Preseason All-America center Hunter Dickinson was held to 13 points and 8 boards. He got in averaging 24.3 points and 12 rebounds per game.Marquette outscored Kansas 46-26 in the

paint and transformed 18 required turnovers into 20 points. Tyler Kolek made 5 steals and Stevie Mitchell had 4 to lead an excellent protective performance by the Golden Eagles, the protecting Big East tournament and regular-season champs.”

I thought Marquette played terrific. I thought they were so fast,”Self said.”We supported and played catchup the whole game, but I actually believed we played better than ball game. We missed a great deal of free throws and mishandled as lots of chances as we did, and a great deal of times messed up chances cause points

on the other end. But they were definitely the far better team tonight. “Marquette, which led 38-28 at halftime, improved to 3-11 versus top-ranked groups with its very first victory given that beating Villanova 74-72 in your home in January 2017. Kansas will want to rebound versus No. 7 Tennessee in the third-place game Wednesday (2:30 p.m. ET, ESPN). The Associated Press contributed to this report.