The Golden Eagles are alive for a Big East tournament berth, but they need a result against the Bluejays to make that happen.
The official Marquette men’s soccer preview for Saturday’s regular season finale has already done the heavy lifting in terms of scenarios for MU, the Big East standings, and the Big East tournament. So, let’s just drop that in:
Saturday’s matchup can will determine where and if Marquette will be seeded in the BIG EAST postseason standings.
Marquette can finish #5, # 6, #7 or #8 or out depending on goal differential tie-break if necessary.
With a win in Saturday’s contest MU will be automatically in postseason BIG EAST play.
With a tie, MU will earn the eighth seed in the conference standings.
With a loss and a DePaul (DU) and Xavier (XU) loss or tie, MU is seeded #8.
With a loss and a DU and XU win, MU, DU, XU tied at 8 points. DU has 6 points. vs. common opponents (COP). MU has 3 points. XU has 0 points in COP. Marquette would be ruled OUT.
With a loss and a DU win and XU loss or tie, DU and MU are tied at 8. DU has 7 points vs. COP, MU has 4 points. MU would be ruled OUT.
It’s not specifically spelled out, but obviously Marquette’s seeding with a win could mean that they could be seeded as high as #5, but they might be lower than that depending on what else happens around the league. Since they can’t be seeded higher than fifth, Saturday’s match will be the last home game of the season no matter what. If Marquette makes the tournament, they’ll play a road game in the quarterfinals, and then the semifinals and title game are at the Maryland SoccerPlex in Boyds, MD.
I think it’s good news that Marquette would get in no matter what with a tie, even if that’s as the #8 seed guaranteed. I think it’s good news that MU still has a chance if they lose, but I wouldn’t hold out a lot of hope in both Xavier and DePaul losing to Providence and Butler respectively. Safe to say that Marquette is best served by a positive result against the Bluejays instead of crossing their fingers and hoping.
REMINDER: Marquette’s home contests are streamed nearly exclusively on FloSports, and the same goes for almost all Big East home matches and almost all league schedule contests. If you are paying full price for FloSports at $30 a month, you are doing it wrong. Please use this link to pay less than half of that, and even less if you can use a Marquette.edu email address.
Big East Match #8: vs Creighton Bluejays (8-5-3, 3-3-1 Big East)
Date: Saturday, November 2, 2024
Time: 1pm Central
Location: Valley Fields, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Streaming: FloSports
Live Stats: Sidearm Stats
Twitter Updates: @MarquetteSoccer
Marquette is 9-10-2 all time against Creighton. The Bluejays have pulled the series in their direction over the past two years with a 2-2 draw in 2022 and a 2-1 contest a year ago in Omaha. The Golden Eagles will be trying for their first win over Creighton in Milwaukee since 2017.
Creighton has nudged themselves two points in front of Marquette in the Big East Midwest Division standings thanks to a run of four wins in their last five matches. The first win in the set was a 2-1 “road” victory against Nebraska-Omaha, but the other three have all been against Big East foes. The last two victories have seen the Bluejays stack up goals pretty notably, as they beat Villanova 3-1 and topped Butler 6-1 last Saturday. Officially, the Butler match is a come-from-behind win for Creighton, as they were trailing 1-0 after 10 minutes had gone by. Three of their goals came in the final 16 minutes as they just kept pounding in goals even though they only outshot Butler 13-10.
The loss in the middle of all of that is a 3-0 road loss against Akron. They conceded a penalty kick goal in the first half, and then — guess who? — Emil Jaaskelainen fired in two before the hour mark, less than two minutes apart. He is very good at this.
Creighton’s offense runs through Jackson Castro. He has seven goals and seven assists, giving him a hand in 14 of CU’s 29 goals on the year. That’s a lot! Miguel Arilla is no slouch with four goals and five helpers, and he’s done that in less than 700 minutes on the year. Gavrilo Civric is even more productive with his time with three goals and five assists in just 433 minutes on the year. Three of those assists came in the Butler game, and in just 21 minutes of action to boot.
Blake Gillingham has played every single minute in net so far this season for Creighton. As you might guess from that 8-5-3 record, it hasn’t been all sunshine and lollipops for him. The 6’2” Californian is letting in 1.31 goals per 90 minutes and stopping just 65% of shots on goal. Given that the Bluejays are outshooting their opponents by a little more than three attempts per game, that’s generally not a great situation for Gillingham.