Fans headed out to the Al McGuire Center on Saturday to get their first look at the 2024-25 Marquette men’s basketball team. The Gold team won the annual Blue & Gold Scrimmage with more than 1,000 fans in attendance.
“Believe it or not, this is a significant step for our team and our players to play a scrimmage in front of our games with officials,” head coach Shaka Smart told the media. “It is just a different dynamic than practice.”
The preseason Associated Press Top 25 poll will be released later this month. Marquette was ranked 17th in ESPN’s “Way Too Early Top 25 rankings” posted less than a month ago. They were ranked fifth in the Associated Press preseason poll heading into the 2023-24 season.
The Golden Eagles are coming off a 27-10 record last season. Three of those losses came to Big East and national champion UConn. Marquette saw Tyler Kolek and Oso Ighodaro each selected in the second round of the NBA Draft. This is one of the steps to replacing those key departures.
Here’s a look at the takeaways from the scrimmage as Marquette is less than a month away from the Nov. 4 season opener against Stony Brook.
Marquette Scrimmage Takeaways: A Newcomer Steals the Show
Two of the incoming freshmen played on the winning Gold team in the Marquette scrimmage. Joshua Clark, a 7-foot-1 center from Houston, Texas, dunked early and often as his 17 points led the Gold team to the 57-51 win.
Royce Parham, a forward from Hudson, Ohio, also played for the Gold squad in the scrimmage, as did 6-foot-11 junior Ben Gold.
Smart and his coaches made some adjustments to allow Clark to play around the rim while the other four players provided the spacing necessary to get the ball down low. It resulted in plenty of crowd-pleasing dunks by Clark.
“Josh, you wouldn’t expect him to be one of the leading scorers,” Smart said. “That was a pleasant surprise for him to get on the rim so much. I thought Royce and Ben playing together, they have been good in practice together but normally they don’t have another new 7-footer out there with them.”
Clark won’t be playing for Marquette this season as the coaching staff has decided to redshirt him. That is not the case for Parham, who had 12 points in the scrimmage.
Great energy at the Al yesterday for our Blue-Gold scrimmage – thank you Marquette Nation! See you on November 4th!#WeAreMarquette pic.twitter.com/NDU4sH9wSm
— Shaka Smart (@CoachShakaSmart) October 6, 2024
Hard Work Is Paying Off For Parham
“Royce is a real worker,” Smart said. “He is really diligent and is up there in the top 3-5 on our team in terms of time spent in this building working on his game outside of practice. He wants to know why. That is a really important attribute for a young player of don’t just tell me what to do but it is let me understand why we are doing what we are doing.”
Parham’s hard work and willingness to listen to the coaches is already paying dividends. He is already pushing for playing time in the first nine practices of the season leading into the Marquette scrimmage.
“I would say that since we started summer school, he has made as much progress as anybody on our team,” Smart said. “He is a guy who has put himself in position as he keeps getting better. He is going to be able to put the ball in the basket if we can put him in the right spots out on the floor.”
Jones Ready To Make His Point
The loss of Kolek leaves Marquette without its floor leader from the last three seasons. After spending his freshman season at George Mason, Kolek had 188, 270 and 239 assists in his three seasons with the Golden Eagles.
Smart didn’t have to look far to find the new point guard. Kam Jones, the team’s leading scorer in each of the last two seasons, will be asked to run the offense in the upcoming season.
Jones had 15 points, five rebounds and 11 assists in the Marquette scrimmage for the winning Gold team. Many of his assists set up dunks for Jones.
“Kam Jones was terrific with a double-double in 28 minutes,” Smart said. “He has been passing the heck out of the ball and that is something we are going to need from him.”
Jones Ready To Lead the Marquette Golden Eagles
Kolek missed five games last season and that gave Jones the opportunity to have the ball in his hands more often. He had nine assists in a win over Xavier and 13 more in three Big East Tournament games.
“It has been a constant dialogue with Kam since the end of last season,” Smart said. “Kam is thought of by a lot of people outside of our program as a scorer or as a shooter but we believe he did a heck of a job last year in a six-game segment when Tyler is out. We knew this offseason that there was room for growth. We have a specific workout called, ‘the passes we make’ and Kam really bought into that. He did that workout several times a week. We are excited about his growth.”
Jones was not the only returning player to have a strong showing in the Marquette scrimmage. Senior David Joplin led the Blue team with 20 points. Classmate Stevie Mitchell finished with 10 points, four rebounds and four assists.
Marquette’s Blue vs. Gold scrimmage is an annual rite of fall that means the #mubb season is almost here.
Here’s a look at some intriguing things that happened yesterday at the Al McGuire Center:https://t.co/c0xCpwy92l
— Ben Steele (@BenSteeleMJS) October 6, 2024
Three Players Miss The Marquette Scrimmage
Sean Jones is still working his way back from a knee injury that limited him to 16 games a season ago. He was one of three players who didn’t play in the scrimmage. Jones was one of eight Marquette players, with an average of more than 15 minutes per game last season.
“Sean is still recovering from his surgery, making good progress,” Smart said. “I don’t have an exact date on when he will be back but we are hopeful that it is some time early in the season.”
Freshman forward Damarius Owens has been sidelined with a groin injury while sophomore guard Tre Norman suffered a shoulder injury after a hard collision in practice. Smart said both players should return to practice soon.
