MILWAUKEE — The Marquette Men's Basketball non-conference schedule includes home games against Baylor and Wisconsin, plus road games at Purdue and Notre Dame. All for a reason.
"What we try to do with the games that we do control, is put our team in a position to be challenged early and often," Marquette Men's Head Coach Shaka Smart says. "To grow from that challenge, and then also, if we play well and take care of business later on in the year, those are games that the NCAA selection committee can point to and say, 'hey, that's a great win for Marquette.' Beating Illinois last year in our third game of the year, (it was) a meaningful game that even though it was literally a week into the season, that game mattered in March. Mike Broeker (has) always done a great job with scheduling here. It's a heck of a schedule."
On Nov. 10, the Golden Eagles host Central Michigan at the Al McGuire Center.
"The game at the Al will be interesting," Smart says. "That was a consequence of there's about a five-day window at Fiserv, where the arena's not available. We have a road game at Purdue that's going to be directly following that window, so didn't really make sense for us to go play on the road two times in a row that early in the schedule. The best option for us was to play here."
Yet it's clear, the atmosphere, especially at Fiserv Forum, helps more than just the play on the court.
"Ben Gold came on his recruiting visit when we played Villanova at home. The way our crowd was, the way our fans were, that went a long way into him coming to Marquette," Smart says. "I want our fans to know you guys have a huge impact, not only on our current team and our current players, but on our recruiting."
The Golden Eagles tip off the season Monday, Nov. 7 hosting Radford. There will be no exhibition games this year.
