Women's Volleyball | 8/28/2014 8:36:00 AM
Live Stats vs. Baylor | Live Audio vs. Baylor
Live Stats vs. Portland | Live Stats vs. Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
Tournament Central
ABILENE - The Abilene Christian volleyball team begins its second year of Division I in grand fashion this weekend as it heads to Waco and Ferrell Arena for the Hampton Inn Waco North Baylor Invitational.
Live Stats are available to view for all six matches. There also are audio links for the three Baylor contests.
Portland of the West Coast Conference and the Southland's Texas A&M-Corpus Christi kick off the two-day four-team tournament Friday at 4:30 p.m. and then its the Wildcats and Bears meeting for the first time since September of 1986 at 7 p.m. ACU will meet the Pilots Saturday at 12:30 p.m. followed by the Islanders at 4:30 p.m.
Corpus Christi was one of the Southland Conference's best teams in 2013, winning 20 matches, including a four-set win over ACU on Oct. 5 in the first meeting between schools.
Portland, however, experienced a very forgettable 2013 campaign, finishing at 0-27 and 0-18 against the WCC. The Pilots recently were picked to finish tenth in the WCC, and are returning ten letterwinners from last season's team while adding five newcomers. There are 11 members of the Portland team who are either freshman or sophomores.
As for the host Bears, they're coming off an injury-plagued 12-20 season that was their first losing year since 2007. However, two of their key players who were hurt are now healthy - freshman outside hitter Katie Staiger and junior outside hitter Thea Munch-Soegaard - and Baylor also gets to work in Iowa State transfer Andie Malloy, who missed all of last season due to NCAA transfer rules. The Bears also are fortunate to only have lost one starter from last year's team, while adding five newcomers.
The Wildcats have experienced their fair share of season-ending injuries as well the last two seasons, but all 15 members were practicing at full strength during Wednesday afternoon practice sessions, including junior right side
Rachel Riley (who missed all of 2013) and senior middle blocker
Neely Borger (who missed all of 2012. Their return to full strength plus the addition of several key newcomers and transfers to a starting core that already features attacker Jennie Loerch, setter
Sarah Siemens and libero
Madison Hoover should help ACU get off to a good start in tournament season.
Loerch, Siemens and Hoover - all starters since their freshman year - were pushed in camp (for the better) by their new teammates. Senior transfer
Taylor Nix from UTEP and freshmen
Corinne Grandcolas and
Stephanie Schoelman are talented outside hitters who will certainly use their height and power to help spread around the Wildcats' offensive attack. Loerch was the go-to attacker for most of last season with Riley injured and finished with more than 30 percent of ACU's total attempts (968 of 3188).
The Wildcats also return on offense sophomores
Dorothy Swanson and
Erica Lambert. Swanson averaged 1.84 points per set through 18 appearances, while Lambert averaged 1.39 in 22 appearances.
At setter, Siemens was joined on the roster by sophomore transfer
Tucker Smith from Hardin-Simmons. Siemens missed only three sets all of last season in finish with 8.37 assists per set, while Smith made second team all-conference after averaging 5.26 per set.
Defensively, Hoover has been at the top of her game the last two seasons. She ranked 40th nationally and sixth in the Lone Star Conference in digs as a freshman in 2012 and last year ranked fifth in the Southland Conference with 4.64 digs per set. And while it's doubtful anyone will take Hoover's position at libero, the Wildcats added two more defensive specialists this offseason in freshman
Nicole Morales and sophomore
Brooke Ray to go along with sophomore
Emily Adkins.
On the block, the Wildcats are hoping for a repeat performance or better from last year's Southland Conference honorable mention
Lexi Mercier, who led the league in blocks (1.44 per set) as a true freshman. Mercier began her collegiate career with 18 blocks through the season's first two matches against UT-Arlington and Louisiana Tech and later blocked 24 attempts in a single weekend against Houston Baptist and Corpus Christi.
