Marquette Women’s Basketball Preview: vs Gonzaga

Got some bad news for you.

Sunday morning is Marquette’s last chance to get a quality non-conference win this year….. and it looks like even if they get it, it won’t be their best win of the season anyway.

After Sunday, Marquette has just two non-conference games left: Le Moyne and Truman State. Le Moyne is currently sub-300 in Ye Olde BartTorvik.com rankings, and Truman State is a Division 2 program that does not even populate into mattering when the NET fires up. As far as wins in hand already, Marquette has the home overtime victory against Wisconsin….. and nothing else in the top 100. They got smushed by a computer top 20 Minnesota team earlier this year and didn’t have the gas to stay with Iowa State on Friday. No shame in those results — although losing by 43 to the Gophers is its own problem — but they were MU’s only other shots at something nice on the resume.

Wisconsin is currently #74 in the Torvik rankings, and Gonzaga sits at #87 on Saturday afternoon. Getting a top 100 win would be a good thing for the Golden Eagles, something that they absolutely need if they want to be an NCAA team…. it just won’t be the crown jewel of their resume, that’s all.

And speaking of things that are not shining beacons in the night….. Marquette has a turnover problem. Halle Vice has a turnover rate of over 27%…. and she is not the worst starter. Olivia Porter has a rate of 31.2% — over 30% of possessions that she “uses” are turnovers! — and she is not the worst starter. That currently sits with Skylar Forbes, who has a rate of 31.4% and had four turnovers in the first half against Iowa State before finishing the game with five.

All four were in the second quarter, coming with Marquette down 3, down 5, down 8, and down 10, all before the 2Q media timeout. I am not saying that Skylar Forbes’ turnovers cost Marquette the game, there was still 25 minutes left to go, same as her four first quarter turnovers did not cost MU the Minnesota game. I am saying that her turnovers 100% unplugged MU’s chances to keep the margin within shouting distance at something of a critical juncture, and I am saying that Skylar Forbes has a turnover problem that is putting a ceiling on what this team can accomplish.

She’s going to have turnovers if she’s going to have the ball and be the team’s leading scorer, and so on.

But turning it over at a rate approaching a third of the possessions that she’s using? That’s really, really bad for the Golden Eagles, and they need to find a way to make it stop.

Game #7: vs Gonzaga Bulldogs (3-4)

Date: Sunday, November 30, 2025Time: 10am CentralLocation: Alico Arena, Fort Myers, FloridaStreaming: FloSports, which will set you back $20 if you want to subscribe for a monthLive Stats: Stat BroadcastTwitter Updates: @MarquetteWBB

Marquette is 3-1 all time against Gonzaga. MU met up with the Bulldogs in three straight seasons — December 2006, November 2007, and November 2008 — and went 2-1, winning at home and losing in Spokane. The fourth meeting came in 2022 when Chloe Marotta put up 18 points and eight rebounds in the Battle 4 Atlantis semifinals to send the Golden Eagles to the championship game of that event.

Gonzaga arrives in the Consolation Game of Coconut Hoops by way of a 76-72 loss to Indiana on Friday. A back-and-forth first half tilted towards the Hoosiers in the third quarter, leaving Gonzaga trailing by as many as 11 at one point. The Bulldogs were able to make it interesting, slashing the margin down to just one point three times in the final three minutes, but the last time came with just 20 seconds left. GU didn’t get a foul to send Indiana to the line, instead fouling Shay Ciezki as she shot, and-1, four point game with 17 seconds left, GU didn’t even get a shot off until the clock was nearly gone and that was that.

It’s the fourth loss in the last five games for Gonzaga, with the lone win coming by way of a 79-60 victory over Eastern Washington at home. You can’t particularly fault Gonzaga for their losses, as Colorado State, Stanford, and South Dakota State are all top 80 programs in the BartTorvik.com rankings, and Indiana’s in the top 50…. but the other three were all at home, and only the CSU loss was closer than three possessions.

That’s maybe not the best start to the year for a Gonzaga team that was picked to finish second in the West Coast Conference in their final year in the league before jumping into the reformed Pac-12 next year. Gonzaga picked up three first place votes in the conference preseason poll, so they should think of themselves as contenders in the league. Torvik currently projects them to go 13-5 in WCC play, which would project as a tie for second place. In short: Nothing about how they’re playing is really changing how things might go in league play, but it’s clear that they’ve been coming up short in the games that were expected to challenge them at home.

Marquette will be tasked with slowing down Lauren Whittaker and Allie Turner’s offensive contributions. Those two are GU’s only two double digit scorers, going for 18.4 points and 15.0 points respectively. The 6’3” Whittaker is more of an inside player than the 5’8” Turner, but both women can step out and hit threes. It’s just that Turner’s connecting nearly 46% of the time and is the much bigger threat there on 5.3 attempts per game.

Gonzaga does seem to be dependent on their shooting working, although four losses does seem to say that holding the 19th best three-point shooting percentage in the country isn’t particularly helpful for them. The Bulldogs turn it over a little too much, aren’t that great at getting second chances, and are borderline bad at getting to the free throw line, so if MU can produce a rough time shooting the ball, that goes a long way to a win.

Same thing for getting second chances on the other end. Gonzaga isn’t a good shooting defense team and they’re objectively awful at creating turnovers there. They are the #13 defensive rebounding team in the country in terms of rate according to Her Hoop Stats, and that’s largely because of Whittaker. She’s the #28 defensive rebounder in the country according to HHS, and Jaiden Haile isn’t too shabby either at #494. If MU can either make shots or find ways to limit Whittaker’s access to misses — the Golden Eagles are not a great OR rate team! — that’s going to pay off.

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