Although Marquette lost to rival Wisconsin last weekend, one of the bright spots in the defeat was the play of graduate transfer Katin Reinhardt. He scored 13 of his 16 points in the first half and finished the day with a 4-of-6 shooting performance from long-range. Reinhardt, who transferred east after semi-successful stints at USC and UNLV, was brought in to be a perimeter threat on the wing. In his three previous seasons, he averaged 11.3 points per game and shot 36.9 percent from long range. There has not been a single season in which the 6’6″ forward failed to average double figures in scoring.
Katin Reinhardt Needs to Excel For Marquette to Reach Its Goals (USA Today Images)
Maybe it just took the senior 10 games to find his groove in Milwaukee, but he hasn’t delivered the goods for Steve Wojciechowski thus far. Per KenPom, he holds the lowest Offensive Rating of the 10 players in Marquette’s current rotation — in fact, he is the team’s only key contributor below 100.0. He has taken 45 three-point attempts on the season (tied for the team-high) but has converted on a chilly 31.1 percent of those shots, nearly six percentage points under his career mark. Strangely, he’s even been worse from inside the arc, sinking only 28.6 percent of his two-point shots on the season. He’s the only Marquette player in the rotation who is shooting so poorly, as all other Golden Eagles are shooting above the 40.0 percent mark. What good is a space creator on the wing if he cannot make jumpers or finish on his occasional drives?
Wojciechowski has already relegated Reinhardt from the starting five to a role off the bench, but he still averages 23.7 minutes per game and remains a high-usage player. According to KenPom, he ranks only behind Jajuan Johnson on the team for percentage of shots taken (24.7%) and percentage of possessions used (22.9%) while on the floor. When a player with that many touches is shooting so poorly, he can quickly become a greater liability than solution. The other newcomers on the team — freshmen Markus Howard (10.2 PPG; 50.0% 3FG) and Sam Hauser (9.3 PPG; team-high 51.1% 3FG), as well as fellow transfer Andrew Rowsey (7.9 PPG, 42.3% FG) — are all making their marks on this team. Reinhardt has greater immediate potential than all of them — he could be a top-tier Big East player if his shooting improves — that could make the difference between the Golden Eagles playing in the NIT or the NCAA Tournament in March.
Only time will tell if Reinhardt’s performance against Wisconsin is the beginning of a turnaround, but Wojciechowski is running out of time to experiment with his role on the team. But in his final year of eligibility, the balance between waiting for his breakout and taking away from others’ development remains a delicate one.