Incarnate Word Live Stats
ABILENE – Abilene Christian and Incarnate Word volleyball complete their shortened 14-match Southland Conference slates with a special Senior Night match Friday at the McDermott Convocation Center.
Most Southland matches are played Thursday night and Saturday afternoon, but this match was moved to Friday to avoid a conflict with UIW's 2 p.m. football game vs. ACU and to allow the Wildcats more time for schoolwork.
Live stats will be made available for the second contest this season between the Wildcats and Cardinals, which begins at 7 p.m. UIW won the first match in Abilene on Oct. 19, 3-0, to trim ACU's all-time series lead to 16-4. A win for the Cardinals would give them their first season series win over the Wildcats, while a victory for ACU would give the two sides their third straight split of a conference series.
As newcomers to the Southland, both the Wildcats and Cardinals have their conference seasons end this weekend while the rest of the league plays through Nov. 16. ACU and UIW each played 14 SLC matches with seven at home and seven on the road, but the remaining 12 squads played 18 conference contests. As a result of this scheduling imbalance, neither former Lone Star Conference school is eligible for the regular-season champion or postseason play.
The Wildcats (6-15, 2-11 SLC) are coming off back-to-back disappointing 3-1 losses at home to second place Northwestern State and Stephen F. Austin. The Wildcats entered the intermission tied at 1-1 in each of their last two matches, but simply could not generate enough offense in games three and four.
There were, however, a couple glowing individual performances in each defeat. In the Halloween Night loss to the Lady Demons, sophomore setter
Sarah Siemens finished a kill shy of a triple-double (9 kills, 29 assists, 14 digs) behind a .400 hitting percentage, and Saturday against the Ladyjacks, freshman
Lexi Mercier blocked eight shots to stay atop the Southland leaderboard with 1.52 blocks per set.
Additional Wildcats ranked among the league's top-15 players are sophomore outside hitter
Jennifer Loerch (3.19 kills per set), Siemens (8.29 assists) and sophomore libero
Madison Hoover (4.71).
The Cardinals (11-11, 6-7 SLC) are 2-2 since their win in Abilene last month as they followed a 3-1 win at New Orleans with three consecutive five-setters against Southeastern Louisiana (L), SFA (W) and Northwestern State (L).
UIW's top players include sophomore attacker Angelique Vidaurri (2.94 kills), senior setter Danielle Suarez (5.74 assists), junior middle blocker Meaghan Patterson (0.94 blocks) and senior libero Sarah Cardenas (3.68 digs).
