VILLANOVA, PA. – The Villanova Wildcats ran their win streak to nine in a row with a thrilling 74-63 overtime win against the Marquette Golden Eagles on Friday evening at the Finneran Pavilion. With the victory, the Wildcats improve to 17-6 overall and 11-3 in BIG EAST play, while Marquette falls to 17-6 overall and 10-4 in league action.
The story of the game was Villanova junior Maddy Siegrist who scored a career-high 42 points to go with a game-high tying 13 rebounds. She was 14-of-25 from the field, 2-of-6 from three-point range and 12-of-12 from the foul line. The 42 points is one shy of the BIG EAST single game scoring mark of 43 and two short of the Villanova school record 44 points.
Following a 10-foot jumper by Jordan King that gave Marquette a 53-49 lead with 5:29 to play in regulation, neither team was able to score for the next 2:28. Wildcat forward Brianna Herlihy ended the scoreless stretch at the 3:01 mark when she drained a three from the right wing to pull Villanova within one at 53-52.
Marquette answered on its next possession when Lauren Van Kleunen connected on a short jumper to put her team up three at 55-52, before Villanova junior Brooke Mullin scored on a lay-up in the paint to make it a 55-54 contest with 2:18 on the clock.
After two Van Kleunen free throws increased the Golden Eagle advantage to 57-54 with 1:58 remaining, both teams failed to score on its next possession. Villanova came up with a big defensive stop and capitalized when Siegrist made a floating jump shot in the lane to pull the Wildcats within one at 57-56 with 35 seconds on the clock.
The Wildcats came up with another key defensive stop and had possession down one with 12 seconds remaining. Villanova attempted to throw the ball to Siegrist in the post, but the pass was deflected and Marquette had the ball with 4.8 seconds to play. Villanova was forced to foul Karissa McLaughlin with 2.9 seconds left. McLaughlin missed the first and made the second and the Golden Eagles led 58-56.
Villanova had one timeout and was able to advance the ball to the front court. Out of the timeout, Siegrist got the ball in the lane and drove to the basket and attempted a running left-handed lay-up where she was fouled with nine tenths of a second left. Siegrist calmly sank both free throws to send the game to overtime.
The overtime was all Villanova as the Wildcats dominated the extra session out scoring Marquette by a 16-5 margin. Villanova scored the first six points of overtime on a breakaway steal by Siegrist, a jumper in the lane by Siegrist and a pull-up jump shot by Herlihy. Van Kleunen connected on two free throws to make it a 64-60 game at the 3:05 mark, before Siegrist and sophomore Bella Runyan converted back-to-back lay-ups to put Villanova up 70-60 with 1:08 on the clock.
Joining Siegrist in double figures was Herlihy who had 14 points, seven rebounds, four steals and three assists. Mullin chipped in with nine points.
Marquette was paced by King who had 14 points along with Van Kleunen and Marotta who had 13 points each. Marotta also pulled-down 13 rebounds.
For the game, Villanova was 26-of-62 from the field (41.9%), 6-of-21 from three-point range (28.6%) and 16-of-16 (100.0%) from the foul line, while the Golden Eagles shot 37.9 percent from the floor (25-of-66), 30.0 percent from long distance (3-of-10) and 71.4 percent from the charity stripe (10-of-14). Marquette owned a 41-33 advantage on the backboards.
Villanova returns to action on Sunday, Feb. 13, when the Wildcats play at Seton Hall. Tip-off is set for 1 p.m., at Walsh Gymnasium.
NOTES: Dating back to the 2019-20 season, Villanova has now won seven straight overtime games…Maddy Siegrist averaged a point per minute in tonight's win with 42 points in 42 minutes…Maddy Siegrist registered her 32nd career double-double and eighth of the season…In tonight's win, Maddy Siegrist moved past Laura Sweeney and Mary Gedaka and into sixth on Villanova's all-time scoring list with 1,575 career points…The Wildcats have now won 10 straight home games and are 10-2 in home contests this season.
