Volleyball | 11/29/2017 8:00:00 AM
TOURNAMENT CENTRAL
SAN MARCOS, Texas – The Texas State volleyball team is set to welcome a loaded field into Strahan Coliseum as the Bobcats will serve as hosts for the 2017 National Invitational Volleyball Championship First and Second Rounds.
Texas Tech (15-14) out of the Big 12 will face off with SMU from The American at 4 p.m. Nov. 30. TXST (24-9) will then play host to Rice (21-8) from Conference USA at 6:30 p.m. The two winners will meet at 6:30 p.m. Dec. 1 for the right to advance to the quarterfinals of the tournament.
All three matches will be contested inside Strahan Coliseum. The event will mark the first time in school history that postseason volleyball will come to San Marcos.
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Fans can purchase one ticket that will provide entry to both first-round matches. General public tickets are available for $8, while youth tickets can be purchased for $6. Texas State students may attend free of charge with a valid ID.
The San Marcos Regional has a stacked field that ranks second among the eight regional sites in cumulative RPI. The RPI's of the four teams are No. 69 (TXST), No. 73 (Rice), No. 77 (SMU) and No. 118 (Texas Tech). The regional is the only one of the eight that features at least three teams ranked and/or receiving votes in the final Volleyballmag.com Mid-Major Poll. SMU is ranked No. 22, Rice is No. 24 and the Bobcats are receiving 11 votes.
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AMERICA'S LONGEST-TENURED STAFF
•   The Texas State full-time coaching staff consists of head coach
Karen Chisum, associate head coach
Tracy Smith and assistant coach
Sean Huiet.
•   The trio has been at Texas State for a combined 66 years (38/16/12), a mark which is by far the highest in the nation for any coaching staff. The next closest is Texas A&M at just 52 years, while Penn State ranks third at 47 years.
A LOOK AT TEXAS STATE
•   Texas State has the fourth-highest RPI among the 32 teams competing in the NIVC, behind only North Texas (47), Georgia (57) and Towson (65).
•   The Bobcats lead the Sun Belt Conference in RPI (69), most wins overall (24), most home wins (12) and most road wins (9).
•   Statistically, TXST leads the league in opponent hitting percentage (.158), assists (13.2), kills (13.9), and digs (17.3).
•   Other than digs in 2013, Texas State has never finished a campaign leading the Sun Belt in a statistical category.
•   The 24 overall victories and 10 non-conference victories are both the highest marks since 2013.
•   TXST will finish the season with a winning record and has reached the 20-win plateau for the fourth time in five years since joining the Sun Belt.
•   In her 38 years leading the Bobcats,
Karen Chisum now has 30 winning seasons and 24 campaigns with at least 20 victories.
•   The Bobcats have four players with at least 300 kills for the first time since at least 2001 (individual stats only go back that far). Those are
Megan Porter (361),
Amy Pflughaupt (321),
Jaliyah Bolden (307) and
Madison Daigle (300).
A LOOK AT RICE
•   The Owls enter postseason competition at 21-8 overall. They recorded an 11-3 record in Conference USA to finish in solo third place in the league.
•   They lost in five sets to No. 6 seed Southern Miss in the opening round of the 2017 C-USA Championship.
•   Rice had an eight-match win streak from late September through the majority of October. The Owls have a 3-3 record since seeing their win streak come to an end.
•   They feature All-C-USA First Team performer Grace Morgan and second team honorees Portia Okafor, Nicole Lennon, Lee Ann Cunningham and Madison McDaniel. Lennon was also selected as the C-USA Co-Freshman of the Year.
•   Rice competed in the previous iteration of the NIVC, posting a 1-3 record in 1995. This is the first postseason berth for the team since 2009.
•   The Owls lead the all-time series with Texas State by a 17-15-1 margin. Despite residing less than three hours apart, this will be the first meeting between the programs since 2001.
A LOOK AT SMU
•   The Mustangs own a 21-10 mark overall and tied for second in the American Athletic Conference at 15-5. The AAC does not have a league tournament.
•   They have reached the 20-win plateau for the fifth-straight year.
•   SMU rattled off a 12-2 record in a stretch of matches that lasted from late September to early November. They have since tallied a 3-3 ledger.
•   The Mustangs boast two All-AAC First Teamers in Katie Hegarty and Lauren Mills. Brittany Adams and Kendall patterson were both selected to the All-AAC Second Team.
•   This is SMU's third-straight postseason berth.
•   The Mustangs own a 5-4 lead in the all-time series with TXST after defeating the Bobcats in five sets (16-14 in the fifth) earlier this season.
A LOOK AT TEXAS TECH
•   The Red Raiders own a 15-14 mark overall and landed in a three-way tie for sixth with a 4-12 record in the Big 12 Conference.
•   This will be the first postseason appearance for TTU since 2001.
•   Texas Tech is 3-11 over its last 14 matches, but the team has faced off with seven nationally-ranked foes during that stretch.
•   Missy Owens was the lone Red Raider to pick up league accolades, as the junior setter was named to the All-Big 12 Second Team.
•   The Red Raiders lead the all-time series with Texas State 20-10-1, but the Bobcats won last year's matchup 3-0.
LAST TIME OUT
•   Texas State fell 3-1 (25-23, 23-25, 25-23, 25-15) to Coastal Carolina in the finals of the 2017 Sun Belt Conference Championship on Nov. 19.
•   The Bobcats were seeded No. 2 in the tournament and were making their first appearance in the league finals since 2014.
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Amy Pflughaupt led TXST with 13 kills, while
Madison Daigle (11) and
Megan Porter (10) also reached double figures.
Erin Hoppe distributed 30 assists, while
Brooke Johnson added 12.
Micah Dinwiddie finished with a team-high 24 digs.
•   Pflughaupt and Dinwiddie were both named to the SBC Championship All-Tournament Team.
•   Coastal Carolina led in kills (59-51), attack percentage (.264-.130), assists (56-43), digs (71-65), and blocks (12-10). Texas State led in aces (6-4).
NEW POSTSEASON OPPORTUNITY
•   The end of the 2017 season has brought the return of a secondary postseason tournament for women's college volleyball teams.
•   The National Invitational Volleyball Championship (NIVC) will be an annual tournament involving at least 32 of the nation's top women's Division I volleyball teams.
•   In total, 32 teams will compete in the revived NIVC. There were 20 automatic qualifiers and 12 at-large selections.
•   The field features 17 programs with 18 or more wins and five schools that finished first in regular-season conference play.
•   Additionally, six schools in the field are ranked or receiving votes in the final Volleyballmag.com Mid-Major poll with No. 13 North Texas, No. 16 UC Irvine, No. 22 SMU, No. 23 Sacramento State, No. 24 Rice, and Texas State (RV).
•   In all, 23 conferences will be represented with both the Big 12 and American featuring three teams each. The Sun Belt, Mountain West, SEC, Horizon, and C-USA will each have two schools competing.
•   The entire 2017 tournament will be hosted by participating schools. Eight participating schools will each host four schools in Rounds 1 and 2 slated for Nov. 28-Dec. 1. The quarterfinals will take place Dec. 2-4. The semifinals (Dec. 4-6) and championship (6 p.m. Dec. 12) will be streamed live on WatchESPN.
•   The previous iteration of the NIVC was held for seven seasons (1989-95) as a 20-team event, but the remodeled format will look similar to college basketball's WNIT.
BOBCATS DOMINATE ALL-SBC AWARDS
•   TXST led the conference with four first-team selections, six overall selections and three specialty award winners, the league announced Nov. 15. The number of first-team honorees and specialty award winners both set new school records, while the collective number of laurels tied the school record set back in 2000.
•   Senior
Erin Hoppe, junior
Madison Daigle, and sophomores
Micah Dinwiddie and
Amy Pflughaupt were all named to the 2017 All-Sun Belt First Team. Senior
Jaliyah Bolden and sophomore
Megan Porter were both selected to the 2017 All-Sun Belt Second Team.
•   Hoppe was honored as the 2017 Sun Belt Setter of the Year, Dinwiddie captured the 2017 Sun Belt Defensive Player of the Year accolade, and Pflughaupt earned the distinction of 2017 Sun Belt Newcomer of the Year. The trio of Bobcats joined Jordan Kohl (2014 Freshman of the Year) as the four specialty award winners for TXST since the maroon and gold joined the Sun Belt Conference.
•   The Bobcats led the league in five of seven statistical categories during league play this year, including hitting percentage (.261), opponent hitting percentage (.144), assists (14.10), kills (14.85), and digs (17.90). The maroon and gold also finished second in the league in aces (1.27) and seventh in blocks (2.10).
-- TXSTATEBOBCATS.COM --
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