MILWAUKEE _ It was a matchup of the Big East's two heavyweights Saturday at Fiserv Forum and both 14th-ranked Villanova and No. 10 Marquette showed why each was deserving of its lofty standing.
After the Wildcats rallied from a 15-point deficit to take the lead, and after the Golden Eagles answered by regaining the advantage, the contest came down to a last possession for the visitors with a chance to win. But Phil Booth got jammed inside and Jermaine Samuels rushed a shot that fell short at the buzzer, and Marquette captured a 66-65 victory.
The Wildcats (19-5, 10-1 Big East), who saw their 11-game winning streak stopped, had no answers for junior guard Markus Howard, who scored 38 points, including two free throws that gave the Golden Eagles (20-4, 9-2) a 66-63 lead with 57.1 seconds to play.
Booth, who scored Villanova's last nine points, connected on a 10-foot jumper to make it a one-point game with 44.4 seconds left. Howard then dribbled time off the clock, but freshman Saddiq Bey tipped the ball loose and gave the Wildcats a last possession with 12.8 seconds to play.
Booth was given the responsibility to either take the last shot or hit an open man. He drove under the basket but was double-teamed. His pass out to Samuels was tipped slightly, and Samuels only had time to rush up a shot that went off the front rim as the crowd of 17,856 exhaled.
Booth finished with 19 points for Villanova and Eric Paschall added 17.
Marquette led, 30-26, at the half behind 21 points from Howard, and a defense that held Villanova to 2-of-14 shooting from 3-point range. The Wildcats got a 3-pointer early in the second half from Bey and trailed by only three, but it went downhill from there for the next six minutes.
The Golden Eagles scored eight straight points to take a 40-29 lead on a short jumper by Sam Hauser with 16 minutes, 38 seconds to play and later extended the margin to 15, 47-32, on a foul-line jumper by Sacar Anim, who scored 14 of his 18 points in the second half, with 12:47 remaining.
But the Wildcats, who were 2 of 12 from the field at that point of the second half, knocked down four straight shots in a 10-0 run to get back into the game. Bey hit a runner from the wing and a 3-pointer to narrow the gap to 47-42 with 9:33 to play.
After Marquette got the lead back to nine with the help of two free throws that marked Howard's 29th and 30th points, the Wildcats roared back with an 11-0 run that featured two 3-point baskets by Samuels, the second one giving his team a 55-53 lead with 6:16 remaining.
The Wildcats couldn't hold the lead, however, and were outscored 11-3 over the next three minutes with Howard and Anim combining for all 11, and Marquette had a 64-59 advantage with 3:07 to play before Villanova's final push.
It was all Howard in the first half for Marquette, which led 30-26 at the break. The 5-foot-11 junior had 21 of the Golden Eagles' points, eight of their 12 field goals and four of their five 3-point baskets. He had two stretches where he scored eight straight points.
