If you were looking for reasons to be concerned about Marquette women’s soccer this fall, the last two matches gave you some pretty solid options.
I thought that Marquette looked like a confident and capable soccer team as they beat Northern Illinois and North Dakota State, putting up back-to-back 2-0 victories. I can’t quite say the same thing about their efforts in a 1-0 win over Milwaukee or a 2-1 loss to #21 Wisconsin. MU’s lone goal against the Panthers came by way of a free kick generated by UWM’s
keeper playing the ball with her hands outside of the box, and then Marquette didn’t look like a team with a woman advantage for the remaining 70 minutes. Sure, Milwaukee’s the favorite to win the Horizon League this season, but even with 10 women, they kind of stagnated Marquette a bit.
As for the Wisconsin match, the Badgers trampled over the Panthers when they played, so it’s no surprise that they were able to do roughly the same to the Golden Eagles. Once again, Marquette’s lone goal of the match was a bit of luck, as VAR handed MU a penalty kick that Jocelyn Leigh converted.
There are hints of 2024 Marquette women’s soccer peeking out of 2025 Marquette women’s soccer right now. Maybe those last two game were just bad matchups for the Golden Eagles, and since styles make fights, things were just working against MU. They get another two contests on Thursday and Sunday here, and from the looks of things, they should be able to dictate terms in at least one of them.
Let’s see how things look when Marquette returns from the Twin Cities, and hopefully we’ll feel a bit better about how things are going in Chris Allen’s second season in charge.
Match #5: at Minnesota Golden Gophers (2-1-0)
Date: Thursday, August 28, 2025
Time: Noon Central
Location: Elizabeth Lyle Robbie Stadium, St. Paul, Minnesota
Streaming: B1G+, which costs $13 for a month of access
Live Stats: Sidearm Stats
Twitter Updates: @MarquetteWSOC
Marquette is 2-7-1 all time against Minnesota. This has been an ongoing series since 2022 and was probably supposed to be ongoing since a 1-0 Marquette win in 2019, but COVID protocols interrupted things until scheduling picked back up in 2022. The Gophers have won in each of the past three seasons, and MU only broke through with a goal in a 2-1 loss last year.
Minnesota comes into Thursday’s matinee contest after thumping Northern Illinois 4-0 on Sunday afternoon. That’s pretty notable, since Marquette beat NIU 2-0 in their opener. Also notable: Minnesota’s 3-0 win over St. Thomas in their second match of the season, and since that’s who MU plays on Sunday, how things go on Thursday might give us a little bit of an idea of what to expect against the Tommies.
The Gophers took a loss in their opener, falling 3-1 at home to BYU. Minnesota went up 1-0 in the 33rd minute of that match, but then gave up three goals after the 54 minute mark in the second half. That game was a wild one, as BYU outshot Minnesota 26-15, and that is A LOT of shots.
Three women have hit the back of the net twice so far this season for Minnesota to end up in a tie for the team lead. Paige Kalal has the slight edge over Davy Mokelke and Mariah Nguyen, as she has an assist on top of her two goals. Mokelke is the one doing more with less however, as she’s played just 59 total minutes this season spread out over the last two matches and scored once in each contest. You could argue that Nguyen is making the most of her chances as she only has four shots on the year, one less than Mokelke. Marquette is going to have to pay attention to Caroline Birdsell and Tenley Senden. They both have double digit shots through three matches, with Birdsell’s 15 topping the team at the moment. With those kinds of shooting numbers, the goals are going to come for those two at some point this year, and I presume Marquette would like that to be sometime after Thursday afternoon.
Sarah Martin has played every minute in net so far this season. Giving up three goals to BYU but none to UST or NIU has evened out her goals-against averaged at 1.00 even heading into Thursday. She’s stopping over 82% of shots on goal, and that’s by only making saves against BYU and St. Thomas. NIU never landed a shot on goal on Sunday……. partially because Minnesota limited the Huskies to one total shot in the entire match….. and that came 90 seconds in. Hit the post, too, but that’s not a save.
Match #6: at St. Thomas Tommies (1-1-1)
Date: Sunday, August 31, 2025
Time: 3pm Central
Location: South Field, St. Paul, Minnesota
Streaming: TommieSports.com allegedly
Live Stats: Sidearm Stats
Twitter Updates: @MarquetteWSOC
Bluesky Updates: @AnonymousEagle, but only after I get home after the men’s game vs Chicago State
Marquette is 3-0-1 all time against St. Thomas. All four meetings have been in the past four seasons, with the tie coming in Milwaukee in 2023. The Golden Eagles have an all-time goal differential of +9 in the series thanks to a 5-0 victory last year.
What else has St. Thomas been up to this year other than taking a 3-0 clonking from Minnesota? They went to a scoreless draw against Northern Illinois back on Thursday for their most recent contest as we publish this, and if we’re being honest, that’s an accomplishment for them. NIU outshot the Tommies 15-5 and keeper Olivia Rowe had to make three saves to earn the clean sheet. Rowe has played every minute so far this season, and thanks to a pair of shutouts on either side of the loss to the Gophers, she’s sitting at a goals-against average of 1.00 and a save percentage of .875.
HOWEVER, one of UST’s three matches this season was a 5-0 shelling of Viterbo, the NAIA school in La Crosse. That is throwing all the stats a little bit off, even if Viterbo did put five of their six shots on frame. It’s affecting things outside of Rowe’s goalkeeping stats, too. For example: Can we really say that Mackenzie Jacobson is leading St. Thomas in scoring as the only player with more than one goal so far when she scored twice against Viterbo AND sat out the Minnesota match AND didn’t attempt a shot against Northern Illinois? With that in mind, maybe Marquette has to spend defensive energy defending Tatum Trettel, who leads St. Thomas with six shots this season. No goals or assists yet, but the redshirt junior from Minnesota with three goals and an assist last season seems like she’s something of a focal point through three matches in 2025.
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