2017 Southland Volleyball Tournament Central
ABILENE – Abilene Christian junior middle blocker Lauren Walker Tuesday was named to the Southland Conference's list of honorable mentions in recognition of her efforts during the 2017 regular season.
Walker earned her first postseason conference citation after ranking seventh among all league players this fall in blocks per set with 1.04. The Round Rock native ranked sixth with 1.08 blocks per set the previous season, and as a freshman she posted the league's 10th-best attacking percentage of .289 through 18 league matches.
Walker this year started all 28 matches and appeared in 99 of 105 sets, scoring 287 points on 222 kills, 11 aces and 103 blocks, five of which were solo.
Walker's best single-match performances of the season took place during ACU's Homecoming Weekend of Oct. 19-21 as she totaled 16.5 points in victories against both Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (W, 3-2) and Incarnate Word (W, 3-1).
These wins would eventually clinch the Wildcats the eighth and final spot in this weekend's Southland Conference Championship (Nov. 17-19).
ACU (11-17) tied Incarnate Word with a 7-9 league record and exchanged a pair of four-set wins with the Cardinals; however, the Wildcats also split their season-series with the third-place Islanders, while UIW went 0-2 vs. Corpus. These records vs. the Islanders served as the final tiebreak between the Wildcats and Cardinals.
In helping ACU score it first-ever win over the Islanders, Walker delivered 12 kills, two aces and four blocks over five sets. Two nights later she hit .310 with a season-high 13 kills and seven blocks vs. the Cardinals.
Walker reached double digits in scoring in all but three Southland matches, and during the non-conference season she tallied 15.0 points in an emotional 3-1 win at Wyoming and accumulated 37.5 points during a three-match winning streak at UTEP. Walker produced kill totals of 10 and 12 during five-set wins vs. Samford and the Miners, and in between she tied her career single-match high with eight blocks during a 3-0 sweep of Delaware State.
The Wildcats return to Corpus Christi Friday for the second time in as many weeks to compete in their first Southland Conference postseason, and in the quarterfinals they'll be pitted against the regular-season champions from Stephen F. Austin. Match time is 11 a.m.
The Ladyjacks beat the Wildcats in four sets during their previous meeting at Moody Coliseum on Nov. 2. Walker in that match scored 14.0 points on 10 kills (.292), six block assists and one service ace, and during their 2016 meeting – a 3-2 win for ACU – Walker tied her career high with 14 kills (.500) to go along with four digs and three block assists.
