MOBILE, Ala. – The University of South Alabama soccer team is preparing for its final non-conference tune-ups of the 2015 season this week as the Jaguars host Marquette and travel to Southern Miss.

The Jags welcome Marquette to The Cage Thursday night at 7 p.m. before going to USM Sunday for a 4 p.m. start.

"We're very excited," USA head coach Graham Winkworth said. "I know we got beat last weekend, but we played our best football of the season so far. A lot of people really stepped up. We were very happy with our performance at Auburn and we're excited to get back on our home field this coming weekend with another big game."

The Jaguars enter Thursday's contest with a 5-2 record overall after a loss Sunday to No. 9 Auburn. USA took an early lead on a goal from Hannah Godfrey but two Auburn goals 68 seconds apart were the difference. Shots were 13-13 apiece while USA held the edge on corner kicks 7-4.

"We were brave in possession and kept it very well against a higher team from the SEC," Winkworth said. "We equaled them from a possession standpoint, and defensively, when we lost possession, worked extremely hard to get it back. Even in areas of the field where we might take it a little easier, we were good when we lost possession. It was a good team performance of which we were on the wrong end of a good game."

This week's contest will allow Winkworth two more opportunities to evaluate position battles – including the one in goal between junior Sarah Hay (Waxahachie, Texas) and sophomore Courtney Baum (Cumming, Ga.) – and fine tune everything before league play starts Sept. 26 at Troy.

"I want to see two more performances, and hopefully continued momentum going into a difficult conference season," Winkworth stated. "We know we're massive underdogs against teams that do well in the SEC and Big East, like Auburn and Marquette, but these are the games that help us prepare for a tough conference season, and hopefully postseason. We're looking forward to having a good home game against a team where we're big underdogs again, then a trip up the road to Southern Mississippi, who have had a couple of very close games with two SEC schools in the last couple of weeks, so we know we're in a for a huge battle in Hattiesburg as well."

Marquette, which received votes in the preseason top 25 poll, is 3-3-1 on the year and went 1-0-1 at the Marquette Invitational last weekend. It will be the first meeting between the two schools.

Thursday will mark just the second road game of the season for the Golden Eagles – the first was a 2-1 victory at Michigan.

"Their record is a little misleading because they don't play a cupcake schedule – they play proper teams," Winkworth noted. "They've played Minnesota and beaten Michigan – Michigan is coached by the former U.S. Women's National Team coach Greg Ryan – so they're playing real teams. A 3-3-1 record is good considering the quality of their schedule. Like I said, we know we're underdogs when we play sides that do well in massive conferences, so we'll just do our best to focus on our performances and hopefully put on a good show for the fans.

"It's difficult to prepare for Marquette, unlike our preparation for Auburn, because we're able to watch Auburn on the SEC Network week in and week out. Marquette aren't on local TV stations down here so we don't know what to expect. We're just going to focus on us and try to be as prepared as we can."

Southern Miss is currently 2-3-3 heading into their road match Thursday at Louisiana-Monroe. All but one game – a 4-0 win at Southern – has been decided by more than one goal and the Golden Eagles are coming off a 0-0 draw at Mississippi State and a 1-0 defeat at Alabama.

The Jaguars have won the last four meetings in the series, including a 6-0 decision last September in Mobile.

"It's a local rivalry game so it's a big game for us. They're very well coached – Coach (Mohammed) El-Zare has done a great job," Winkworth said. "He's a former coach at South Alabama so he knows our program extremely well. He has his team playing football in the right way. They've got some very good players, and don't start many of the players that we faced last year – they're basically a new team from what we saw. We have to make sure we prepare extremely well for this team because they've got a lot of talent, particularly from their new players. We're in for a difficult game."

For more information about South Alabama athletics, check back with www.usajaguars.com, and follow the Jaguars at www.twitter.com/USAJaguarSports. Season tickets for all Jaguar athletic events can be purchased by calling (251) 461-1USA (1872).

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