Marquette University Athletics
Golden Eagles Announce Spring Dates
3/4/2010 12:00:00 AM | Women's Soccer
March 4, 2010
Complete Spring Schedule (PDF) 
Tournament of Friends Schedule (PDF)
MILWAUKEE - The Marquette women's soccer team has announced it will play eight matches and host an indoor tournament during its 2010 spring season. The Golden Eagles will face opponents from the BIG EAST, Big 12, Big Ten and Horizon League conferences. The schedule is loaded with quality teams whom finished with a winning record and 2009, including NCAA Tournament participants Texas A&M, Milwaukee, Purdue and Wisconsin.
"We have a great variety of outstanding teams on our schedule who will challenge us this spring to improve, learn and build toward the fall," said BIG EAST Coach of the Year Markus Roeders. "The team has worked extremely hard since the first day of classes in January, and deserves a lot of credit for its commitment. The individual training, strength and conditioning, and team training over the past few weeks are paying off."
The Golden Eagles will open the 2010 spring season with its seventh annual Tournament of Friends Sunday, March 7 at the Marquette Gym. The Tournament of Friends will feature two Marquette teams of current players: a Marquette Blue Team and Marquette Gold Team, an alumni team, Wis.-Whitewater and the Marquette Club soccer team.
"Once again, we have split the team into Blue and Gold squads, and their goal is to meet in the final on Sunday afternoon. We are certain that the other teams will have something to say about it, and we appreciate the MU Club team, UW-Whitewater, and of course, our alumni joining in for a fun day of competition. Having our former players around and compete always brings back a lot of memories, and is definitely a highlight of the spring. It will definitely be a Marquette family day at the Marquette Gym. After the weekend, our focus will shift outdoors and we have an outstanding schedule compiled to test us this spring," said Roeders.
The tournament games will be small-sided; four field players and a goalkeeper, and played with a futsal ball. It will be a round-robin style tournament with 25-minute games. The two teams highest in the standings after round-robin play is complete will play in the championship game at 3:30 p.m.
"Our annual Marquette indoor tournament has traditionally been a great start to the competitive portion of our spring training and bridges the gap between the indoor and outdoor portion of our schedule," said Roeders.
The Golden Eagles will move outdoors on Saturday, March 27 when they face Texas A&M and Baylor in College Station, Texas. Marquette will meet Baylor at 4 p.m. and Texas A&M at 7 p.m.
Baylor finished its season 8-6-5, while Texas A&M stood 15-7-3 in 2009 and advanced to the Sweet 16.
On Sunday, April 11, the Golden Eagles open a four-game with Nebraska and Milwaukee at Valley Fields. The Golden Eagles will play Nebraska, who finished 11-5-4, at 10:30 a.m., and Milwaukee, who won its sixth Horizon League Title and earned a berth in the NCAA Tournament, at 3:30 p.m.
The Golden Eagles will close out the homestand by hosting DePaul and Wisconsin at Valley Fields on Saturday, April 17. Wisconsin advanced to the Sweet 16 in 2010 for the first time since 1993, while DePaul earned its first winning record since 2003 at 10-9-2 overall.
Marquette will close out the spring season at Illinois taking on a pair of Big Ten foes in Illinois and NCAA Tournament participant Purdue. The Golden Eagles will meet the Illini at Noon and play the Boilermakers at 4 p.m. Both games will be played at the Illinois Soccer Stadium.
