Wojo and Marquette: A Match Made In Basketball Heaven
By J.P. Scott
Though they are struggling right now, the future looks bright for Steve Wojciechowski and Marquette.
I am a bit of a purist. I like to believe, in a world driven by Power-5 schools and football money, that there are still basketball schools.
Marquette is a basketball school.
Granted, it’s not a Duke, Kansas or a UCLA, but when people hear someone say “Marquette”, they usually think of Al Maguire, Dwyane Wade and basketball. It’s a storied program at a Catholic school in an urban setting in perhaps the nation’s last basketball-centric conference. As such, Marquette deserves a coach who recognizes, respects and represents that.
“Wojo” — as he’s referred to by many in and around the sport, is a perfect fit for the Marquette program. After Buzz Williams ran out on the Golden Eagles for what amounted to a lesser job, Marquette needed to hire a true basketball guy who wanted to be there. I’m not sure they could have done better Wojciechowski. He is a blue-collar guy fit for a blue-collar job like Marquette.
This is a guy who played for Mike Krzyzewski at Duke and would go on to cut his coaching teeth on the Duke bench under the same man. Other Duke assistants over the years jumped from the Duke bench to other jobs quickly. Wojo stayed for 15 years and learned all he could from the greatest college basketball coach of all time.
Wojciechowski’s first season at Marquette has been a bumpy one — though some might say that was to be expected. Williams didn’t exactly leave him a full cupboard to work with talent-wise, even though they did return a lot of players with experience. An early season loss at home to Omaha and a loss in the conference opener at Depaul are both fairly accurate reflections of the current talent level at Marquette right now.
Regardless of the bumpy start, the Marquette players have taken a liking to Wojciechowski and enjoy playing for him. That’s one huge hurdle cleared. The next hurdle would be recruiting for the future in order to be able to compete in a strong conference going forward.
Right now, it looks like Wojciechowski is doing alright in that department as well.
Marquette has three commits for 2015 from the ESPN 100 — good enough to be ranked as the No. 5 overall recruiting class in the country. The prize recruit of that class is 6-10 power forward Henry Ellenson of Rice Lake, Wisconsin. Because he’s a Wisconsin kid, you’d think Ellenson would be an easy get once you win the battle with Wisconsin.
Not true.
Ellenson’s list of offers looks like a who’s who of college basketball. Wojciechowski had to beat out all of those other schools along with heavy efforts from Tom Izzo at Michigan State and John Calipari at Kentucky to land the in-state product. I guess you would have to expect that sort of a recruiting battle when you are talking about a top-five prospect.
In addition to Ellenson, Wojciechowski pulled in another in-state prospect in point guard Nick Noskowiak. Some thought it was Wojo’s history as a point guard that sealed the deal for Noskowiak choosing Marquette. I personally think that even their playing styles are similar, which may have really been what drew Wojo to him.
Wojciechowski also won a recruiting battle with conference rival Georgetown to land shooting guard Haanif Cheatham of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Cheatham is a slasher who knows how to attack the rim, but can stop short and hit a jumper in transition if he needs to. He looks like a prototypical Big East shooting guard.
I think it might take a couple of years — years I know the Marquette brass is willing to give Steve Wojciechowski — but I’m confident that the Golden Eagles are on their way back to the top of the Big East Conference and national prominence. Between the pedigree of their new coach and the history of the program, that’s about as safe a bet as there is going forward in college basketball.
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