When I watched Marquette women’s basketball struggle their way to a loss in their opener against a UCF team that is projected towards the bottom of the Big 12 this season, I had a bad feeling about Sunday night. Sunday night brought a visit to Champaign to face an Illinois team that 1) was earning preseason top 25 votes and 2) beat #19 Florida State in their opener.

It seemed like a bad mix: Good team coming off good win hosting team figuring themselves out and maybe struggling a wee bit more than necessary until that gets settled.

What we got was, instead, Marquette’s defense making Illinois work incredibly hard for anything they got all night long. Facts are facts: The Illini shot under 28% for the full 40 minute experience and because they don’t really want to shoot three-pointers anyway, they went just 2-for-11 from outside the arc. Bad shooting combined with not getting a little bit of a bonus here and there on a three meant that Marquette was able to keep Illinois in view for long stretches of this game.

Marquette’s problem, the one that ultimately resulted in the Golden Eagles taking a 65-53 loss, was how often Illinois was getting to the free throw line. 35 trips, 31 makes. 31 points with the clock stopped, and on top of that, Lee Volker fouled out while Jada Bediako and Charia Smith were limited to just 10 and 9 minutes respectively, and Olivia Porter spent the final 12 minutes of the first half on the bench with two fouls, too. Marquette had to play without the lineup they truly wanted out there or at the very least played very carefully because of the fouls, and that took a little bit of the teeth out of what they could do.

So when Illinois scored the final seven points of the first half to open up a nine point lead, 29-20, at the break, that might have ultimately been the end of Marquette’s chances. MU’s offense — 0.74 points per possession — just wasn’t enough to keep pace with the Illini, even with MU’s defense doing a number on them when the ball was live. That arm’s length reach at the break allowed Illinois to get enough space to eventually build the lead as high as 16 in the third quarter and then 19 in the fourth. The end margin looks a little neater than how the second half went as MU scored seven points in the final 90 seconds, so maybe I shouldn’t be so positive about how this went…..

…… but I can’t help but think the game goes differently with a different whistle.

The big development in this game was what Lee Volker brought to the table. She spent her first year in Milwaukee coming off the bench and, to be honest, looking a little hesitant a lot of the time. Not here, not in Champaign, she looked like Marquette’s most confident and dynamic player. Before she fouled out in 34 minutes, Volker put up 18 points on 7-for-15 shooting, including 2-for-5 behind the arc, and she added eight rebounds, three assists, and a block. There weren’t a lot of offensive standout moments in this game for Marquette, but if this is what Lee Volker is going to be this year, Cara Consuegra has something to build with.

How about some highlights, courtesy of GoMarquette.com and Big Ten Network?

Up Next: A lot of time off. After two games in four days, Marquette will now only play one in a 13 day run. On top of that, the one game isn’t even a Division 1 contest. The home opener is next Monday against Division 2 Illinois-Springfield, and the Prairie Stars are 0-2 so far this season. That one has an 11am tipoff because it’s the annual Milwaukee Public Schools Day. MU’s next D1 game comes on Sunday, November 24, and that will be the return bout with IU Indy after Marquette visited the Jaguars last season.