Paint Touches reaches 1 million page views

Paint Touches passed 1 million page views today, 772 days after our first post. (USA Today)

When a Junior Cadougan-less Marquette team went into Madison, Wis., and defeated Jordan Taylor and the Badgers, the Internet was buzzing. Marquette was ranked 16th in the country and upended the 7th ranked team in the country, ending a 23-game home winning streak in the process.

And, in reality, that was the birth of Paint Touches, too.

We, as a team, wrote five stories that day, totaling almost 7,000 page views. It was far and away our biggest day in the three-plus months we had been covering the Golden Eagles for the Marquette Tribune. And that day, Dec. 3, 2011, has come full-circle in a sense, as our website surpassed 1 million page views today.

In true Buzz Williams form, that’s 772 days in between our first post (Marquette seeks next great walk-on) and now.

All today’s post is meant to say is THANK YOU. Thank you to our loyal readers, our biggest critics, local and national writers who have plugged and promoted our stories, friends, family and journalists who have written for this website that holds a special place in our hearts (and in our daily schedules).

Our first thank you goes out to the writers at Anonymous Eagle and Cracked Sidewalks. When we first began the website our goal was to complement those outlets, and they both immediately reached out to us and helped us get going, participating in Five Point Play write-ups, linking to our stories and providing support on social media. We’ve always looked up to both, and it was pretty cool for us to work with them. Thank you for getting us started. A special thank you here to Brad Galli, who was always our inspiration in student media. He defined professionalism, and what he did with Marquette TV was exactly what we wanted to accomplish in print media. We hope we followed his legacy and at least partially filled the gigantic shoes he left behind. The next No. 32, if you will.

Next up are our writers. We’ve had dozens of contributors over the last three seasons who have contributed to those million page views. In no order, thanks to: Mike Nelson, Michael LoCicero, Matt Trebby, Bobby Bancroft, Jeff Wolf, Marco Radenkovich, Mike Singer, Alex Jesswein, Tess Quinlan, Chris Chavez, and various writers from different beats who also helped out with the aforementioned Five Point Plays. If we forgot you, we apologize. We appreciate it all.

Our loyal readers. Man, you guys are great. To the recruiting hyenas, the night owls, the RT’ers and favoriters on Twitter, the commentors and the critics, there’s always a handful of readers ready to digest what we produce at any given time. Our following is small in the grand scheme of college basketball, but it’s huge to us. Keep it going. Tell your friends.

Our last thank you goes to Buzz Williams and the players who have come through the Marquette program, whether for four years or two months. We’ve had our favorite interviewees (Jae Crowder, Chris Otule, Jamail Jones head that list) but for the most part players have been open and available. Thank you to all. Scott Kuykendall, Mike Broeker, Mike Wittliff, Luke LeNoble and others in the athletic office have allowed us access to the program the last six seasons that have been instrumental to what we’ve accomplished.

That’s all we’ve got. We’re looking forward to the next million page views and hope you come along with us for whatever’s next in this crazy ride. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

— Mark Strotman and Andrei Greska