I am sure all of our players are excited at the phrase "We are finished with pre-season practices!". After 2 weeks of nothing but volleyball the players will start school this Monday and start gearing up for their first matches of the season this coming Friday.
We have seen great strides with our development this preseason. We still have much to improve if we wish to meet our goals, but we are starting to look like a strong unit.
We ended preseason with a team scrimmage that allowed us to give everybody equal reps to show their 'stuff'. At this point we are still unsure of who 1/2 our starters will be. Currently, it looks like it will be a game-time decision for some of these spots. With our youth comes great opportunities at certain positions and this has created a competitive atmosphere with these players. If we can keep this development up I see us having different options later in the season. Ahhh, a coaches' dream!
At the scrimmage we started to see some fight in certain players and team synergy being displayed on offense and defense. Unity is always important but this will be relied upon heavily until we gain more experience throughout the season.
Seniors Lauren Thedford and Teresa Dunn have shown great strides since last year. They will be at one of the OH and S positions respectively. Junior Erika Dupree will most likely be the other S and serve as a RS hitter when front row. Sophomores Lauren Beville and Kelsey Mangum are battling it out for the libero spot. Junior transfer Keidra Williams is stepping out at the MB position. The other spot at MB is closely contested between sophomore Erin Dougherty redshirt freshman Laura Iwuchukwu. Redshirt freshman Haleigh Cearly and sophomore Stormi Lancaster are fighting for the 2nd RS position with freshman Rosalyn Thorpe close behind. The last OH position is extremely close with freshmen Halie Harton and Ashley Davis. Both bring a great presence with them on the court.
IF we can have a sense of urgency this team has tremendous potential. They are fun to be around and know how to handle the coaches when we get a little 'upset':) This team has a great energy.
I welcome all of you to join us this coming Friday and Saturday for our opening tournament where we will be hosting 10 teams. The tournament schedule will be online soon. The matches we play are extremely important for us in terms of regional seeding: UTPB, St. Ed's and DBU are the top 3 programs in the Heartland Conference. These matches will go a long way in helping us secure a spot in November. Our 4th match will be against rival LCU, a great program just down the road. Please check out times and location at www.gobuffsgo.com. Hope to see you there!
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