MILWAUKEE, Wis. (Sept. 23, 2005) ? The USF volleyball team opened up its conference portion of the season dropping its BIG EAST opener to Marquette, 3-0 (30-14, 32-30, 30-27), at the Al McGuire Center in Milwaukee, Wis., Friday night.

Although the last two games of the match were close, Marquette (7-5, 1-0 BIG EAST) out-played USF (1-8, 0-1 BIG EAST) overall to get the win. The Bulls struggled offensively, being out-hit .215 to .104, and defensively, trailing in digs (58-46) and blocks (8-4).

Sophomore Kristina Fabris had another stand-out match for USF, tallying her sixth-career double-double in an 11-kill, 10-dig effort. Michelle Stalbaum chipped in 11 kills and seven digs in the match, while recording her 22nd-career 10-plus-kill outing.

With the score tied 4-4 in game one, the Golden Eagles used a 9-2 run to take a 13-6 lead. The closest the Bulls would come within the lead was four points (14-10) before a 16-4 run by Marquette closed out the game, giving the Golden Eagles the 30-14 win. USF struggled in the game, as the Bulls were out-hit .324 to .000 and committed a total of nine more errors than Marquette (15-6).

No one had the advantage in game two as it featured 13 tie scores and seven lead changes. It wasn't until the very end ? the score 30-30 ? when Marquette scored back-to-back points to win the second game. Both teams played a solid game, however USF was slightly out-hit in the game, .294 to .250. Fabris paced the way for the Bulls, recording eight kills while Stalbaum chipped in six kills.

Game three mirrored the previous one, as there were 18 ties and eight lead changes. It wasn't until the score was tied 25-25 that a 5-2 run was used by Marquette to complete the sweep, posting the 30-27 win in game three. Both Fabris and Stalbaum chipped in nine kills in the game, while Fabris and Johari Williams tallied two blocks each.

The Bulls will look to tally their first BIG EAST win of the 2005 season when they travel to Syracuse to face the Orange on Sunday at noon.