This past weekend, the Lady Lion’s travelled to Mobile Alabama for the Jaguar Invitational to take on three separate opponents.
On Sept. 2-3, the Lady Lions Volleyball team took on South Alabama, Florida A&M and Florida International in three grueling matches that brought their overall record to 1-5.
In the first match against South Alabama, the Lady Lions forced a fifth game, but could not pull out the final set. The final scores came out as 25-18, 25-15, 22-25, 23-25 and 15-12.
The second game against Florida A&M was rough for the Lady Lions because it was played less than an hour after their first match. The final score was 25-23, 20-25, 14-25, 15-25 and 15-12.
“I thought we played really well against South Alabama,” said Head Coach Jim Smoot. “But, unfortunately we played a two and half hour match against them and then we just had a half hour break and we had to play our next match. Fatigue really set in in the middle of that second match and I think that took a toll on us. But, I think we made improvements in some areas. We also saw the areas we need to work on too.”
On the final day of the Jaguar Invitational, the Lady Lions took on Florida International, but unfortunately could not pull out a win. The match went back in forth in wins with the Lions pulling out wins in the second and fourth set causing a fifth set. The final score of the match was 25-17, 20-25, 25-21, 21-25 and 15-11.
Elyssa Purcell, a redshirt freshman, was named to the All-Tournament team and had a team high of 22 assists along with 10 kills. Senior Madi Odom also had double-double with 12 kills and 14 digs. Senior Parrie Hartley contributed 12 kills while sophomore Haley Baker and 21 assists.
Purcell and freshman Chloee Holden served three aces and a total of 11 aces during the match for the Lady Lions. Smoot wants his team to move forward from this while still working on the starting lineup and competing.
“We’re a pretty young team trying to combine the new players with our returners, get a starting lineup and figure out the direction we wanna go with the team,” said Smoot. “We thought we had a good chance against all the teams we were playing, so we just wanted to compete hard.”