Triple Double Kam: #15 Marquette 76, #6 Purdue 58

The Golden Eagles suffocated the Boilermakers’ potent offense, all while Kam Jones posted the 3rd triple double in program history.

If I told you that Kam Jones was going to miss every single three-pointer that he attempted during #15 Marquette’s home game against #6 Purdue, what would you have pegged the result of the contest as?

It’s not a pretty thought, is it?

Thankfully, Gary Parrish’s Little Homie From Memphis knows how to do more than shoot. That was full display at Fiserv Forum on Tuesday night as, yes, Kam Jones went 0-3 from beyond the arc…… but he was 7-for-9 inside of it for 17 points, and he added 13 rebounds, and thanks to a Stevie Mitchell three-pointer with 51 seconds to go, 10 assists.

Yes, that’s a triple double for Kam Jones. It is just the third triple-double in program history, etching Jones’ name next to Tony Miller and Dwyane Wade as the only players to ever accomplish that feat. All of that, in combination with a career and game high 21 points from Mitchell and a whole bunch of other contributions from a lot of guys, totaled up to YOUR Marquette Golden Eagles scoring a resounding 76-58 victory over the #6 ranked team in the country.

The wild part about the Jones triple-double? He was sitting on three points, seven rebounds, and six assists at halftime. 1) He was on triple-double watch AT HALFTIME, and 2) He put up 14/6/4 in the final 20 minutes of the game, which would be an outstanding game from nearly every single player in the country.

Oh, and check this out: Is it good to be in the same conversation as Tristen Newton and Denzel Valentine?

Back to Jones putting up a very nice first half of basketball, to make my point about what happened in this game. Let me describe my experience like this: I remember glancing at the scoreboard and thinking, yep, heck of a game, 12-12 after eight minutes.

The next time I looked at the scoreboard, it was after Damarius Owens got to the rack for an and-1 — his first collegiate bucket, by the way — and converted the freebie. I was thinking, man, what a tough basket in a tight spot for a freshman with four whole minutes of action coming into tonight………

And Marquette was up six, 21-15.

I was shocked. I was sure the game was tighter than that.

Purdue didn’t just roll over and die, of course. They’re a good basketball team, a team coming off shoving then-#2 Alabama into a garbage can in the second half at Mackey Arena on Friday night. But a Kam Jones layup — his only bucket of the entire first half — with 6:10 left before intermission triggered a 10-3 Marquette burst. MU by TEN, 31-21, with 4:25 left in the half.

It ended up a seven point game at the break, 35-28, and it honestly felt, maybe because Jones had just three points, that Marquette had played a B+ half of basketball. Maybe not on the defensive end as they pestered the Boilermakers into nine turnovers and limited them to 0.78 points per possession…. but it definitely felt like MU had an extra gear to find.

They didn’t find it immediately out of the locker room as Purdue popped off the first four points of the second half, and the two sides were trading punches for a bit after that. A Kam Jones layup pushed the lead to nine, 46-37, with 15:19 to go. Purdue answered, getting back to within five, 51-46….. and it was time to sweep the leg, to steal from The Karate Kid.

All of those possessions where Fletcher Loyer was pestered out of an easy shot, all of those possessions where Braden Smith had to dribble into open space just to throw something up…. all of it started adding up and emboldening Marquette. They posted a kill, three stops in a row, moving the lead back to nine along the way. Those three stops were the first part of a run of nine stops in 11 possessions — and one of the failures was a mere lonely free throw — and with just under five minutes to go, Stevie Mitchell drained a feed in transition from Chase Ross, boom, 12-3 Marquette run across nearly five minutes, Golden Eagles up 63-49.

Game over.

Yeah, yeah, they had to play the rest, but time was working against Purdue and Marquette knew the clock was their friend. They got meaner and nastier on the defensive end — honestly you could say they were getting meaner and nastier all game long — knowing that making Purdue work for any useful shot was all they needed to do to ice the win.

How about some highlights, courtesy of GoMarquette.com and Fox Sports? Yes, Jones’ 10th assist is in there, it’s the very last clip, and honestly, it’s an absurd pass to Mitchell in the corner.

Up Next: Marquette will be at the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas on Saturday for a 10am Central time tipoff against Georgia. That game will be streamed exclusively on FloSports, and if you behave, maybe we’ll do something different than our regular Game Thread for it. The Bulldogs are coming off a 48 point win over Alabama A&M on Tuesday night to move to 4-0 on the year.