The student news site of Marquette University

Marquette Wire

The student news site of Marquette University

Marquette Wire

The student news site of Marquette University

Marquette Wire

BORN: Roeders one of MU’s best kept secrets

Dating back to March, coaching positions have been a hot commodity at Marquette. Two major sports (men’s and women’s basketball and volleyball) saw a coaching change in the past year. Men’s basketball coach Steve Wojciechowski has become a favorite at Marquette after creating a top-5 recruiting class for 2015, and women’s coach Carolyn Kieger has created a program that some believe will make noise in the Big East this season.

But at Marquette, there is one coach who not many people talk about, but deserves all the credit in the world: women’s soccer coach Markus Roeders.

Tuesday night, Roeders will coach the women’s soccer team in the Big East Quarterfinals at Valley Fields. The last time Marquette did not host at least one part of the Big East tournament was in 2007. For the past seven seasons, the Golden Eagles have finished no worse than 4th in the Big East.

Roeders’ squad looked like it might snap the streak early in the season. The Golden Eagles were 2-5-1 at one point, suffering defensive breakdowns and dealing with an inability to score. Then Roeders worked his magic, and Marquette handed then-No. 16 Kansas its first loss of the season. The win kickstarted a six-game unbeaten streak, which propelled the Golden Eagles back to the top of the Big East.

Marquette finished the regular season 9-8-2, just barely above .500. Still, it keeps an extremely impressive streak going for Roeders. Since Roeders started coaching Marquette women’s soccer in 1996, he has never had a losing season. Ever.

Roeders has a 272-95-37 career record. His teams never had more than eight losses in a season. He’s won seven conference championships, earned 10 NCAA tournament appearances, five coach of the year awards and was named the Conference USA Coach of the Decade in 2004.

Even with Roeders’ many accolades, perhaps the biggest reason why he is forgotten in the coaching discussion at Marquette is because of his failure to win national championships. Roeders has not gotten outside of the third round of the NCAA tournament. His past two seasons were regarded as the best chances for him to do so, but he fell short of the Sweet Sixteen both times.

Marquette fans are excited for what Kieger and Wojciechowski will bring to the floor come winter. But students should not be so quick to gloss over Roeders, because he is the definition of excellence at Marquette.

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