When: Saturday, February 15, at noon Central
Where: Al McGuire Center
Audio/Visual: Home games mean FREE live video streaming! Live stats will be here.
Special Promotions: They'll be handing out NMD rally towels at the door, and some lucky students in attendance will win VIF tickets for the men's game against Xavier. If you have a ticket to the men's game, YOU GET IN FREE! There will be shuttles leaving right from the McGuire Center heading straight to the Bradley Center after the conclusion of the women's game.
Twitter Updates: @MarquetteWBB
Marquette sits at 7-5 in Big East action and alone in fifth place in the league. Still left on the schedule: home dates against second place DePaul and fourth place Creighton along side road dates against first place St. John's and third place Villanova. That's an awful lot of chances to make some noise in the standings heading down the stretch, but it can't be done without a win over the Musketeers.
In the season's first match up of these two squads, Marquette had to claw their way back into the game after letting Xavier take a 14-8 lead to start the game. MU had a 17-0 run late in the first half to give themselves a double digit lead, but Xavier tied it up late. A monster three from Arlesia Morse and free throws from Brooklyn Pumroy locked the game away for the Golden Eagles.
Shatyra Hawkes had 14 points to tie for the Xavier lead in points in that game, but XU has announced this morning that Hawkes has been dismissed from the team due to a violation of athletic department rules. Hawkes was leading Xavier in scoring at 13.9 ppg, and that mantle now passes to senior guard Ashley Wanninger at 10.7 ppg. Hawkes was also the assists leader for the Musketeers at 3.7 per contest with no one else averaging more than 2. Hawkes and Wanninger were the only two Musketeers to start every game this season, and the only two averaging more than 30 minutes a game. Xavier has lost their last six games and eight of their last nine. Is losing their best player going to pull the team together, or is it going to create a vaccuum that this squad won't be able to fill?