The Prairie View men’s basketball program traveled to Milwaukee, Wis., for their season opener last Friday, falling to Marquette University 97-58.
In front of 14,046 at the Bradley Center, Prairie View was out-shot, out-rebounded, and just not strong enough in the post, allowing 62 points in the point and out rebounded 51-19.
Prairie View guard Michael Griffin hit his first shot of the night for a 3-0 lead, but it was all downhill from there. MU scored 15 of the next 17 points. A basket by Joseph Fulce gave the Golden Eagles a 15-5 lead with 14:20 remaining in the first half.
The Golden Eagles made eight of its first 11 shots, and the rout was on. Marquette led 53-23 at halftime after starting two sophomores and two freshmen.
“The first half was terrible,” Panthers coach Byron Rimm said, “We came out nervous, we came out shell-shocked. We’ve got about three or four freshmen that play a lot of significant minutes. You kind of warn them, but they don’t realize until they step out there on the floor that the passes that you make, the soft passes, aren’t going to go through when you play Division I basketball.”
Prairie View had only two players score in double figures. Senior guard Trant Simpson scored a team high of points, followed by Griffin, who tallied 11 points of his own.