Volleyball Hopes To Benefit From Home Cooking

Last season, Marquette volleyball earned their first ever NCAA tournament berth and picked up their first ever NCAA tournament win in the process. There's only one way to follow that up, and that's by boosting the non-conference schedule.

Yesterday, the athletic department announced the 2012 volleyball schedule and there's two main notes to the schedule. First, there are seven opponents on the schedule that made it to the 2011 NCAA tournament, including five of Marquette's 14 non-conference opponents. The other note is that 19 of Marquette's 30 matches this season will be at home, and one of the road matches is at UW-Milwaukee. The Golden Eagles will only leave Milwaukee for non-conference matches to play in the Xavier Tournament hosted by Xavier University in Cincinnati.

Let's get to a quote from coach Bond Shymansky on the schedule, then hit the jump for the full listing!

We have built our program to be one of the best in the country by playing the best in the country and we are playing another high quality schedule this year. We expect very tough challenges during the first four weeks of the season to get us ready for the rigors of the Big East slate. We are most excited about hosting 19 home matches at the Al McGuire Center this fall. This gives our loyal supporters plenty of chances to help us to victory, and a great opportunity for us to build on our home court advantage with another record-breaking season.

Marquette Challenge:
Friday, August 24: vs Bowling Green, 7pm
Sunday, August 26: vs Northwestern, 2pm

Xavier Tournament:
Friday, August 31: vs Ole Miss, 9am
Friday, August 31: vs Tennessee Tech, 4pm
Saturday, September 1: at Xavier, 3pm

Ambassador Hotel Golden Eagle Classic:
Friday, September 7: vs Eastern Illinois, 10am
Friday, September 7: vs Michigan, 7pm
Saturday, September 8: vs Wake Forest, 7pm
Sunday, September 9: vs Northern Iowa, 2pm

Marquette Invitational:
Friday, September 14: vs Pacific, 7pm
Saturday, September 15: vs Iowa, 1:30pm
Saturday, September 15: vs Milwaukee, 7pm

Saturday, September 22: vs Syracuse, 2pm
Saturday, September 29: at Notre Dame, 6pm
Sunday, September 30: at DePaul, 2pm

Friday, October 5: vs Pittsburgh, 7pm
Sunday, October 7: vs South Florida, 2pm
Tuesday, October 9: vs Western Michigan, 7pm
Saturday, October 13: at Seton Hall, 6pm
Sunday, October 14: at Rutgers, 1pm

Friday, October 19: vs Cincinnati, 7pm
Sunday, October 21: vs Louisville, 2pm
Friday, October 26: at Georgetown, 7pm
Sunday, October 28: at Villanova, 12pm
Tuesday, October 30: at UWM, 7pm

Friday, November 2: vs Connecticut, 7pm
Sunday, November 4: vs St. John's, 2pm
Friday, November 9: at Louisville, 6pm
Sunday, November 11: vs Notre Dame, 2pm

Friday, November 16-Sunday, November 18: Big East Tournament in Pittsburgh

Saturday, November 24: vs Northern Illinois, 6pm

All times are Central. Louisville and Notre Dame are both on the schedule twice as the Big East elected to go with two mirror opponents for every team following the departure of West Virginia.