COMMERCE – The Texas A&M University-Commerce volleyball team begins a new era as they travel to Lake Charles, Louisiana, for the Lions' first Southland Conference match on Thursday evening against McNeese. On Saturday, the Lions return home to host the Lamar Cardinals for its first home match of the season and its first Division I Southland Conference home match.
LIONS WEEKEND SCHEDULE
LAST TIME OUT FOR THE LIONS
The Lions finished out the Hampton Inn Classic in Nacogdoches last weekend with a victory over Arkansas State in the second match of the tournament, 3-1, and falling to SFA and Eastern Washington. With seven aces in the match against Arkansas State, the Lions hit .226.
Lyric Hebert (Arvada, Calif.) ended the weekend with 48 digs.
Reese Fetty (Farmersville) recorded 34 kills;
Celeste Vela (Guadalajara, Mexico) had 98 assists.
Taryn Cast (Peaster) led the way with 12 blocks for the Lions.
Against the Eagles, the Lions went to five sets with each team having multiple opportunities to close it out, but Eastern Washington prevailed 21-19 in the fifth set.
WHAT'S AHEAD FOR THE LIONS
Southland Conference play continues at Houston Christian at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday.
LIONS SWEEP PANTHERS FOR FIRST DIVISION I WIN
A&M-Commerce picked up its first win in the Division I era on September 6 at Prairie View A&M in three sets. This win also snapped a six-match losing streak to start the season and it was A&M-Commerce's first win over a Division I opponent in the athletic department's history.
SLC PRESEASON POLL
In their first season in the Southland Conference, the Lions were picked No. 7 out of 10 teams in the preseason poll. The full poll can be found below.
2022 SLC VOLLEYBALL PRESEASON POLL, PRESENTED BY READY
| Place |
Team (First-place votes) |
Total |
| 1 |
Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (13) |
157 |
| 2 |
Houston Christian (7) |
151 |
| 3 |
Southeastern |
125 |
| 4 |
McNeese |
106 |
| 5 |
UIW |
95 |
| 6 |
Northwestern State |
83 |
| 7 |
A&M-COMMERCE |
54 |
| 8 |
Nicholls |
50 |
| 9 |
New Orleans |
46 |
| 10 |
Lamar |
33 |
SCOUTING THE COMPETITION
The McNeese Cowgirls are starting a new chapter under new coach Sasha Karelov. As a former assistant coach at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi for the last three seasons, she assisted the Islanders to the 2021 regular season title, back-to-back Southland Conference Tournament championships (2020 and 2021) and participate in the 2021 NCAA Tournament.
The Cowgirls are 4-10 on the season, with wins over Tulsa, South Florida, Texas Southern, and Sam Houston. McNeese is currently ranked No. 4 in the country in digs per set with 17.59, and No. 11 in the country with a value of 37.37 team attacks per set.
For the Cardinals, Brandon Crisp is entering his first year as coach for Lamar and has a current record of 6-5. Crisp if a former NJCAA Division III Coach of the Year, and three-time NJCAA District Coach of the Year, and a 2017 NJCAA National Championship during his time in Mesquite.
The Cardinals are restricting their opponents to hit .178 percent on the season. Kaitlyn Gil leads the team with 171 kills in 46 sets played for an average of 3.72, she had 25 kills in the match against Tulane. Kaitlyn Gil also leads the team with 128 digs averaging 2.78 digs per set.
-TAMUC-
