Marquette Is In The Spring 2021 NCAA Men’s Soccer Tournament!

With the words “And happy Monday to Marquette,” a six year streak came to an end. That’s how the NCAA selection show announced that YOUR Marquette Golden Eagles men’s soccer team earned an at-large berth in the spring 2021 NCAA Men’s Soccer National Championship tournament.

The Golden Eagles are 8-2-1 this season after losing to Seton Hall in the Big East tournament semifinals. That was Marquette’s only loss in regulation this season, which is largely speaking due to the fact that Marquette went to overtime eight times during the regular season. The Golden Eagles went 6-1-1 in overtime matches this season, prevailing with a sudden victory golden goal in six of their eight extra time matches.

The entirety of the NCAA tournament will take place in and around Cary, North Carolina, which is why MU will have to wait a little bit before they actually get their tournament run started. Marquette will face off against Loyola Marymount on Sunday, May 2nd at WakeMed Soccer Park in Cary, NC, at 2pm Central time according to the NCAA’s official bracket. The Lions made it into the field as the West Coast Conference champions, and they have a record of 6-0-2 overall and 5-0-2 in WCC play.

I’m guessing that Marquette was pretty easily inside the cut line when it comes to at-large berth. The top eight teams in the field earned national seeds in the bracket, with the top four teams getting the winner of an opening round game in their first game. Marquette has advanced directly to the second round of the tournament, and since MU isn’t playing one of the teams seeded 5 through 8, that means the Golden Eagles were at least 12 spots away from the bottom of the overall seed list. Heading into the Big East tournament, Marquette was in the top 10 in the RPI, but when you take your worst loss of the season in your conference tournament game and there’s only 14 at-large berths AND you’re one of three ranked teams in your league, then you could see how maaaaaaaaaybe the committee might end up leaning to leave you out.

Seton Hall is your spring 2021 Big East tournament champion, and they earned the #6 national seed and a first game date with Air Force on Sunday, May 2nd. Georgetown also picked up an at-large berth out of the Big East and they received the eighth and final national seed. The Hoyas will play High Point in their opening game, which will also be on May 2nd.

This is Marquette’s fourth ever appearance in the NCAA tournament. They last reached the field in 2013, which was the second of back-to-back appearances as well as the only time that MU has won a game in the NCAA tournament, defeating Akron 1-0 in extra time to advance to the Sweet 16. In addition to MU’s 2012 and 2013 appearances, the Golden Eagles also qualified for the tournament back in 1997.

Keep your eyes and ears open for future information about streaming broadcast information for Marquette’s game against LMU. Seeing as MU drew playing at the same stadium where the national championship game will eventually be played, I don’t think the facilities will be the hold up on making sure we get to see the lads in action.