For the second time this season, the Marquette Golden Eagles and DePaul Blue Demons are going to square off on the hardwood. Back on January 23, the Golden Eagles won by 10 over the upset-minded Blue Demons. Now, DePaul will play host to 10th-ranked Marquette and the frontrunner for Big East Player of the Year in Markus Howard.

Howard and the Golden Eagles come into this one on the heels of a major win over the Villanova Wildcats on Saturday. National Marquette Day went off like a bang as MU hung on to defeat ‘Nova 66-65. This was a big bounce back off of a home loss to the St. John’s Red Storm earlier in the week.

DePaul, meanwhile, has rattled off two consecutive victories as they go into this battle. The Blue Demons handed out defeats to both the Providence Friars and the Xavier Musketeers. The latter was very significant, as they had yet to defeat Xavier in their home dwelling of the Cintas Center since the Musketeers joined the Big East Conference prior to the 2013-14 season.

Max Strus is the usual driving force for DePaul, but the Blue Demons have gotten plenty of burn lately from Paul Reed. Reed scored 15 points in the win over Xavier, and put up 18 points against Providence earlier in the week. He’s gotten into double figures in eight of his last nine games and his shooting percentages have been solid as well. Against Big East opponents, his eFG% and TS% stand ninth and sixth in the conference. So Reed is getting it done and is doing so at an efficient clip, as well.

While Marquette got it done against Villanova, they will obviously be hoping Tuesday night’s matchup against DePaul will be a more collaborative effort. Markus Howard scored 38 of MU’s 66 points, and Sacar Anim contributed 18 of his own. So 56 of the 66 points scored were by two people. While that is obviously prodigious in its own right for both Howard and Anim, they’re going to need a more collective performance from everyone else. The Hausers, Sam and Joey, should be the ones MU ought to lean on in this regard. They’ve proven they can fill up the statsheet so it won’t be too surprising if they do it again on Tuesday.

All told, this should prove to be a fun game. DePaul has played very well of late, and Marquette is obviously one of the best teams in the nation. MU should likely win this game, but it could be a competitive contest.

HOW TO WATCH

Time: 7 p.m. CT

TV: Fox Sports Net

Watch Online: Fox Sports Go (Where Available)

ODDS

(via OddsShark)

Spread: Marquette (-3)

Total: 149.5/150