Friday, October 9, 2009

A-Sun What to Watch For - Oct. 9, 2009

Cross Country:
• Four Atlantic Sun schools head to Florida for three different races. The only meet featuring multiple A-Sun schools takes place in Orlando, Fla., when Kennesaw State and Mercer partake in the Walt Disney World Cross Country Classic. The Owls enter following an off week. Mackenzie Howe, owner of four victories, four A-Sun Runner of the Week honors and most recently a spot in Sports Illustrated’s Faces in the Crowd, attempts to continue her undefeated season. At this same meet last year, she turned in a fifth-place showing.
• In other cross country action, UNF’s men and women compete at the FSU Invitational in Tallahassee, Fla., and Stetson races at the Embry-Riddle Invitational in nearby Daytona Beach, Fla. Next week, the Hatters host their own invitational, an event that will host four other A-Sun schools.

Men’s Golf:
• Two A-Sun schools host men’s golf tournaments this weekend. Mercer hosts 14 of the top golf programs in the country for the Brickyard Collegiate Golf Championship. The tournament begins Saturday morning and features ten of the nation’s top 50 teams including No. 14 UNF. Georgia has won the event each of the last two years. On Sunday, FGCU welcomes schools in for Men’s Invitational in Estero, Fla. at the West Bay Beach and Golf Club. Stetson will also tee it up at the event.
• In other action, Campbell plays at The Big Five Invitational beginning Saturday. On Monday Belmont and Lipscomb square off at the UTM Skyhawk Classic while ETSU participates in the Jerry Pate National Intercollegiate. Seamus Power shared Medalist honors at the event in 2007 joining the list of champions that includes Stanford’s Tiger Woods, 1994 and LSU’s David Toms, 1988.

Women’s Golf:
• Four Atlantic Sun schools head to Daytona Beach, Fla. for the LPGA International Xavier Invitational contested on the Legends Course. Campbell, Jacksonville, Mercer and Stetson make up part of the field. For the third time this fall, the Camels and Hatters, last April’s top two finishers at the A-Sun Championship, meet in the same event. Campbell has bettered Stetson at both events.
• Also the weekend, USC Upstate heads north for the at Rutgers Invitational and Belmont travels to Jonesboro, Ark., for the Lady Indian Classic.

Men’s Soccer:
• Belmont freshman Brandon Tarr added to his goal total against Campbell. Tarr now has five goals which tie for second most in the Atlantic Sun Conference. He is also second in the league in points per game with 1.43, and is tied for second in total points with 10.
• Stetson split with the Jacksonville teams on the road over the weekend defeating JU 4-2 and falling to UNF 2-0. The loss to UNF was the first blemish on the Hatters’ record this season.
• Lipscomb has struggled to score goals, but they hold down the top three spots in the conference in shots. Garrett McLaughlin leads with 36 followed by Andrew Chamberlain with 35 and Garret Pettis with 31.

Women’s Soccer:
• Belmont’s Sari Lin takes her 269 minute shutout streak on the road this week as the Bruins will travel to battle Mercer and Kennesaw State. Belmont and Kennesaw meet at 2:00 p.m. Sunday live on ASunTV in a rematch of A-Sun tournament semi-final a year ago.
• Not only has Campbell (7-6, 2-2 A-Sun) already eclipsed last year’s overall wins total (5-10-3), but with 16 goals through 13 matches, the Camels have also passed last season’s tally of 13 goals scored in 18 matches.
• Stetson goalkeeper Andrea Garavaglia picked up her fifth shutout of the season against Campbell. The only other team to shut out Campbell this season was NC State. She is now tied for the A-Sun lead in that category.

Volleyball:
• Senior libero Shelley Walroth reached yet another milestone and is setting her sights on cracking one of the top 25 spots in NCAA history. The Cincinnati native needs 82 digs to crack the top 25 all-time and has a chance to etch her name in the record books for some time. Walroth currently leads the A-Sun with an average of 5.24 digs per set.
• The Lady Bisons rank in the top 10 as a team nationally in NCAA Division I in two categories. They rank fifth in kills per set with 14.66 and sixth in assists per set with 13.55. Lipscomb is one game match away from sweeping the first round of the A-Sun round robin. They play USC Up¬state at Allen Arena on Friday. Junior middle hitter Alex Kelly, the Atlantic Sun Player of the Week, ranks 12th nationally in NCAA Division I with 5.18 per set.
• The Owls are nearing the end in a stretch of four consecutive matches against schools from Florida with a 2-1 week, defeating Stetson 3-1 on Thursday, defeating UNF 3-0 on Friday, but falling 3-1 to Jacksonville. In KSU’s 16 matches this season, only two have ended after three sets. The Owls lost to Lipscomb 3-0 on Sept. 26, but swept UNF 3-0 on Friday.
• USC Upstate sophomore middle blocker Morgan Thomas needs just seven blocks to become the first player in the D-I era to reach 150 rejec¬tions. Junior libero Megan Healey ranks ninth in school history with 945 career digs, just 55 digs from becoming the eighth in school history to reach 1,000.
• After pushing its winning streak to seven matches, Jacksonville (10-5, 6-2) returns home to Swisher Gymnasium beginning with ETSU (6-10, 5-3) on Friday at 7 p.m. The match, named the A-Sun “Match of the Week”, can be viewed on ASun.TV.

No comments:

Post a Comment

The Atlantic Sun blog welcomes all comments, critiques and questions. We only delete those comments that are abusive, off-topic, use excessive foul language, or include ad hominem attacks. We pre-moderate comments on our blog posts.