The first schedule in the Doc Holliday era of Marshall football is a dandy. And it includes a meeting with his alma mater and former coaching stop in prime time.

Marshall will host the Friends of Coal Bowl for a second time in the 2010 season and will do so under the lights at Joan C. Edwards Stadium. The Thundering Herd and the West Virginia Mountaineers will collide on September 10 at 7 p.m. in a nationally-televised game on ESPN.

Holliday, a former Mountaineer standout, was West Virginia's Associate Head Coach the past two seasons before taking his first head coaching job in December at Marshall. Holliday also worked at WVU under Don Nehlen before coaching mvoing on to coach for the North Carolina State and Florida programs.

His first Thundering Herd team will try to become the first to win against a Mountaineer squad.

The West Virginia showdown will be one of two in Huntington to be televised by ESPN. Marshall and UCF will meet Wednesday, October 13 on the All-Sports Network.

Before the West Virginia game - which will be Holliday's debut in front of the home fans - Marshall will play under the lights in Columbus on Thursday, September 2, against the Ohio State Buckeyes.

Following a road game at Bowling Green, the Herd will face off with the Ohio Bobcats in Huntington in what will be a rematch of this past December's Little Caesar's Pizza Bowl, won by the Herd.

In addition to the home games with WVU, Ohio and UCF, Marshall will host UTEP (October 30), Memphis (November 13) and Tulane (November 27).

Other road games will be at Southern Mississippi (October 2), East Carolina (October 23), UAB (November 6) and SMU (November 20).