Herd Volleyball readies for CUSA tournament
Photo Graphic courtesy of Herdzone.com.
College athletics is dominated by football and men's basketball, that's as true at Marshall University as it is anywhere else in the country. However, while the majority of fans have been caught up in the frustration of an underwhelming football season or the anticipation that the start of basketball season brings, another sport has had an exceptional year with far less notoriety.
Of course, I'm talking about the Marshall volleyball team which will take on Rice (19-7, 10-4) in the quarterfinals of the Conference USA tournament in Houston Texas on Friday. The Thundering Herd women have put together a stellar season going 22-7 overall with an 11-3 record in conference play. In fact, the women haven't lost a match in nearly a month, winning five straight since being swept by 20th ranked Western Kentucky the league's regular season champion and the tournament's top seed, 3-0 back on October 28th.
The Herd seeded third in the tournament will face a tall task against the sixth-seeded Owls as Rice swept Marshall earlier this season 3-0 on the exact same floor. In that match, Rice downed the Herd 25-18 in both the first and third sets while narrowly taking the second set 25-23.
But, coach Mitch Jacobs' team has been much better since that meeting, winning seven of its last eight contests by a combined 24 sets to eight. The only hiccup the aforementioned loss to the Hilltoppers. Marshall will be looking for its first volleyball tournament title since 2005 when the Herd defeated Houston 3-2 to advance to the NCAA tournament. To do so however, the Herd will likely have to avenge all three of its regular-season conference losses, as Southern Miss, the Herd's other loss, sits in the two seed and is likely to advance to the semi-finals over seventh-seeded North Texas.
This season marks the eighth time under Jacobs that Marshall Volleyball has earned 20 or more wins and the first time since 2009 when the Herd went 22-9. Earlier this week CUSA announced its all-conference honors and Marshall's Ally Kiekover and Allie Kellerman were both First Team selections while Madison Hill was awarded Second Team honors.
The Herd, also had three selections on the CUSA All-Freshman team, as Madelyn Cole and Jac'cara Walker joined Hill in rookie recognition.
Marshall and Rice are set to face off Friday evening at 6 p.m. eastern time.
