DePaul Falls in Season Opener at Marquette

Friday, February 12

Milwaukee, Wis.

5:00 P.M. CT

DePaul University

0-1,0-1Big East

Marquette

6-1,1-0Big East

DePaul

Marquette

2/12/2021 6:38:00 PM | WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL

Box Score Box Score (PDF)

Blue Demons make seasons debut against No. 25 Golden Eagles

MILWAUKEE, Wis. – The DePaul volleyball team took the court for the first time in a long time as the Blue Demons opened the 2020-21 season at Marquette on Friday evening. The Blue Demons were on the short side of a 3-0 (25-19, 25-13, 25-19) match at No. 25 Marquette as DePaul played for the first time since Nov. 24, 2019.

"It felt great to be out there competing and to get eyes on us against a good team. We weren't able to serve as tough as you need to in order to stress an offensive Marquette team and we didn't perform as well in the dig to transition phase which catered to their strengths" expressed Head Coach Marie Zidek.

"That said, there were a lot of silver linings tonight. Avarie has been playing very well, and that carried to tonight and all of our freshman showed some good moments. While the execution was not there, the opportunities were. We look forward for another opportunity tomorrow and will certainly grow from this experience."

The Blue Demons dropped the first set by a score of 25-19. Emma Price led the team with five kills while Isabelle Banez tallied four digs. DePaul trailed 19-11 and pulled to within five, but Marquette pulled out the six-point win to open the match.

Hanna Karl sparked the Blue Demons early in the second set with back-to-back aces to take an early 6-5 advantage. Marquette then reeled off five straight points and pulled away to take the second set by a score of 25-13.

The third set saw Avarie Evans-Allen lead the Blue Demons through the first half of the frame with three straight kills. After DePaul tied the score at 12-12 off a Marquette miscue, the Golden Eagles put together a run to extend their lead to 16-12.

Coming out of a DePaul time out, Marquette continued to hold the advantage before another big kill for DePaul by Donna Brown ended the run.

The Golden Eagles stretched their lead out to 21-15, but the Blue Demons didn't back down and three straight kills started by Emma Price and followed twice by Evans-Allen forced a Marquette time out with the score at 23-19.

Marquette (5-2, 1-0 BIG EAST) scored the final two points to close out the 3-0 decision.

Evans-Allen led DePaul (0-1, 0-1 BIG EAST) with 10 kills and a .643 hitting percentage while Molly Murrihy totaled 22 assists in her DePaul debut. Allison Dennemann had nine digs while Karl and Sierra Ellison registered two aces apiece.

DePaul returns to Milwaukee on Saturday afternoon for the second match against Marquette in the weekend series. Start time at Al McGuire Center is set for 3 p.m.