The season is set to open on Monday, November 2nd, and if you go take a peek at a calendar, this likely means that Marquette will play two home contests against buy game level opponents in the first week to 10 days of the season, maybe three games. Then, on Wednesday, November 11th, Marquette is set to visit Michigan. I think it’s safe to say that Marquette won’t play again after that one before they head to Chicago to see Mizzou four days later, right?

I’m also not feeling super great about playing the reigning national champions on the road as the third or fourth game of the season and then lining this one up right in its wake. That’s kinda turning this one into a very early litmus test as to whether or not Shaka Smart’s evolution of the roster is actually going to work, especially if the Golden Eagles come out of Ann Arbor with a not-completely-unexpected loss.That’s before we even get to the part where Missouri head coach Dennis Gates has had the Tigers in the NCAA tournament in three of his four seasons on the sidelines in Columbia. Yes, he went 0-18 in SEC play in the other year, but it’s been back-to-back 20 win seasons since then.

You’d have to project Mizzou in the general direction of an NCAA tourney bid heading into next season, so again: Very much testing whether or not MU actually Has It very early in the season.I don’t like the idea of going back to Chicago for a third neutral site game in two seasons, either. Look, if Gazelle Group or whoever is paying Marquette to be in these games or at the very least covering expenses so it’s not costing the athletic department anything, then this isn’t the worst idea. I know Marquette has a strong alumni base in Chicago because I can read admissions data, and serving that market with a game that’s not the yearly visit to DePaul does make a lot of sense because MU doesn’t control when the game at Wintrust gets played.

But MU double tapped the Chicago alumni base for two non-conference games last year, and the attendance for both of them was lackluster at best. The Indiana game drew 14,017 to the United Center, and that was with Indiana fans taking up the majority of the occupied seats in the 20,000 seat home arena for the Chicago Bulls. The Oklahoma game drew 2,587 to UIC’s arena, which is listed by KenPom.com with a capacity of 8,000 and there were very few Sooners supporters in the building.

I always thought that game was a bad idea on Thanksgiving weekend, and the lack of ticket sales just supported my point there. Now MU is going back to Chicago and the United Center with an opponent from much further away than Indiana and in an offseason where the Golden Eagles are in much more tumult than they were a year ago when you could squint and say “well, Shaka Smart will figure this out, right?” Feels like this could go sideways on the attendance pretty quickly.Just don’t schedule a second one in Illinois, okay? Thank you.By the way: This is just the third game on the slate that we know so far, with Michigan and Wisconsin lining up as the other two.

Wonder if we’re going to get a quality opponent at Fiserv other than the Badgers…..Oh, one last thing. Marquette is 4-5 all time against Missouri. The first two meetings were back in the 1950s in a pair of home and home series games.

That happened again in the late 1970s, then Mizzou beat Marquette in the 1982 NCAA tournament before a home and home set in 1983 and 1984. This game will be the first regular season meeting since 1984, as the last two encounters were in the NCAA tournament. The second most recent one was the 101-92 overtime win for Marquette in 2003, and the most recent one was 83-79 for Missouri in 2009.

That would be the “Lazar Hayward stepped in bounds” game, as well as the game that caused the NCAA to chance the injured player replacement free throw shooter rule. FUN FACT: Now deposed Providence head coach Kim English is the guy who shot the free throws instead of JT Tiller who fell on his wrist and then immediately returned to the game.Follow Anonymous Eagle on social mediaFacebook: AnonymousEagleInstagram: AnonymousEagleSBNBluesky: AnonymousEagle