Women's Basketball Game 25: Marquette (12-12, 4-7) vs #2/3 Notre Dame (23-1, 11-0)

Marquette and Notre Dame will tip things off at the Al McGuire Center this afternoon at 1:50 pm. If you're trying to figure out the odd start time, worry no more. This game's part of ESPN2's "whip around coverage," according to my cable guide. I don't know how long ESPN2 will be sticking with this one, so your best bet to watch this will be to head down to campus. This game is part of the Play 4 Kay initiative, so Marquette will be sporting pink unis and pink shoes.

It's quite the change in opponents from Marquette's last outing. MU is coming off a buzzer beater loss to Cincinnati, who previously did not have a win in Big East play. Now Terri Mitchell and her team go to the other end of the spectrum and are faced with the task of finding a way to hand Notre Dame their first loss of the Big East schedule. The Irish have won 18 in a row since suffering their only loss of the season to #1 Baylor.

I was actually surprised to find out that Notre Dame's Skylar Diggins has only been Big East Player Of The Week once this season. That said, she's been named to the conference Honor Roll three out of the last four weeks. Diggins is 6th in the conference in scoring (15.9 ppg), fourth in steals (2.8 spg), and perhaps most importantly to Notre Dame, first in assists (5.7 apg). Junior forward Natalie Achonwa is going to put a serious dent in Marquette's ability to try to control this game through rebounding, as she averages 9.2 caroms per contest.