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First things first: It's the final game of the regular season, so that means it's Senior Day for Marquette. They'll be honoring the careers of the 13 seniors on the squad, the first four year players in MU history. It's those 13 players that have created the foundation of this program, and it'll be a pretty big deal all the way around.
It's an even bigger deal because there is a postseason berth on the line here. Well, kind of. Let me explain.
It's true that Marquette can get into the Big East tournament regardless of whether they win or lose against the Bearcats on Friday night. Things get significantly easier with a win, though.
With a win, Marquette gets in with either a Georgetown win over Temple, or a Temple win by three or fewer goals. MU & Temple winning moves those two teams into a three way tie with the Hoyas, so the tiebreaker for the final two spots in the Big East tournament has to be settled through goal differential. If Marquette loses to Cincinnati, they'll still make the tournament as long as Georgetown gets the W against Temple.
This is going to sound slightly insane, but it might actually be to MU's benefit for Temple to win a thriller against Georgetown. That's the only way that Marquette can end up as the three seed in the Big East tournament, which means that they get to play #2 Connecticut and not #1 Florida in the semifinals. MU played a competitive game against the Huskies, while the Gators completely blew them off the field during their regular season meeting.
Amanda Bochniak Watch: The junior attacker needs two assists to tie Claire Costanza's single season record for helpers. It might be a little disrespectful to take away her record on her own senior night, but them's the breaks.
Big East Game #7: vs Cincinnati (4-12, 0-6 Big East)
When: Friday, April 29, 2016, at 5pm Central
Where: Valley Fields
Audio/Visual: The Big East Digital Network on Fox Sports Go will carry the broadcast, plus there's live stats.
Special Promotions: First 100 students get a free Marquette Lacrosse shirt!
Twitter Updates: @MarquetteWLax
The Bearcats aren't good.
It's now been over three years since they won a Big East game. In fact, that April 28, 2013 victory against Rutgers is their ONLY Big East win since they joined the league. The good news for Cincinnati is that they've already won twice as many games this season as they won a year ago. The bad news is that they've lost 10 straight games coming into tonight's regular season finale.
They're last in the Big East in goals, last in draw controls, last in shots, and last in shot percentage. They are leading the Big East in one category, but it's not a positive: Cincinnati is called for the most fouls per game in the league. This is good news for Marquette, because the Golden Eagles are the second most foul prone team in the league.
It's been a long slog of a season for Cincinnati, but Megan Bell (27G, 14A) is actually one of the best scorers in the Big East. She's got the eighth best points per game average in the conference and the ninth best assists per game average. Courtney Curtis joins Bell amongst the ranks of 20+ goal scorers with 22 on the season. Meg Gulmi has manned the UC net for all but about an hour's worth of minutes this season. While UC's results haven't gone in her favor, it's largely not her fault. Gulmi is sitting middle of the pack in the Big East in both goals-against average (10.14) and save percentage (.459).