MATCH 1: Marquette vs. Texas State
Time / Date	4 p.m. / Friday, August 24
Location	Waco, Texas
Arena	Ferrell Center
Live Stats	Statbroadcast
Video	None
Audio	None
Match Notes	Texas State
Series History	Marquette leads 1-0

SAN MARCOS, Texas – The Texas State volleyball team is set to begin the 2018 campaign at the Hampton Inn & Suites Waco North Baylor Invitational Aug. 24-25 in Waco, Texas.

The Bobcats are coming off a 2017 season that saw the side post a 25-10 mark, which included a 14-2 record in Sun Belt Conference play and a Sun Belt West Division title.

The season-opening tournament features a treacherous field that includes No. 16 Baylor, No. 26 Marquette and No. 36 LSU. All three

MATCH 2: Texas State at Baylor
Time / Date	10:30 a.m. / Saturday, August 25
Location	Waco, Texas
Arena	Ferrell Center
Live Stats	Statbroadcast
Video ($)	Baylor All-Access
Audio	None
Match Notes	Texas State
Series History	Texas State leads 28-17-2

programs competed in the NCAA Championship a year ago.

The maroon and gold will open the season against Marquette at 4 p.m. Aug. 24. TXST will then face host Baylor at 10:30 a.m. Aug. 25 before wrapping up play against LSU at 5 p.m. later in the day. Baylor's Ferrell Center has a new clear bag policy for fans planning to attending matches this weekend.

AMERICA'S LONGEST-TENURED STAFF

MATCH 3: LSU vs. Texas State
Time / Date	5 p.m. / Saturday, August 25
Location	Waco, Texas
Arena	Ferrell Center
Live Stats	Statbroadcast
Video	None
Audio	None
Match Notes	Texas State
Series History	LSU leads 3-1

•    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 69 years (39/17/13), a mark which is by far the highest in the nation for any coaching staff. The next closest is Bryant at just 52 years, while St. John's and Northern Iowa are tied for third at 49 combined seasons.

A LOOK AT TEXAS STATE
•    Texas State finished last season with 25 wins and the first postseason triumph in school history. The maroon and gold knocked off Rice in the opening round of the National Invitational Volleyball Championship.
•    The Bobcats ended 2017 leading the Sun Belt Conference in RPI (70), most wins overall (25) and most home wins (13).
•    Statistically, TXST led the league in opponent hitting percentage (.160), assists (13.21), kills (13.97), and digs (17.54).
•    Other than digs in 2013, Texas State had previously never finished a campaign leading the Sun Belt in a statistical category.
•    The 25 overall victories and 10 non-conference wins from last year were both the highest marks since 2013.
•    TXST ended last year with a winning record and reached the 20-win plateau for the fourth time in five years since joining the Sun Belt.
•    In her 39 years leading the Bobcats, Karen Chisum has 30 winning seasons and 24 campaigns with at least 20 victories.
•    The Bobcats had four players with at least 300 kills for the first time since at least 2001 (individual stats only go back that far). Those were Megan Porter (379), Jaliyah Bolden (338), Amy Pflughaupt (330) and Madison Daigle (314).

A LOOK AT MARQUETTE
•    Marquette tallied a 22-10 record overall in 2017 and finished second in the Big East Conference with a 15-3 ledger.
•    The Golden Eagles lost 3-2 in the finals of the conference championship to Creighton and earned an at-large berth into the NCAA tournament.
•    MU was selected to win the Big East in the 2018 preseason coaches' poll.
•    The team features the reigning Big East Player of the Year in Allie Barber and fellow preseason All-Big East selections Jenna Rosenthal and Hope Werch.
•    The meeting between TXST and MU will be just the second in school history. The only other clash was a 3-2 Marquette triumph in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that came in 2009.

A LOOK AT BAYLOR
•    Baylor finished last year at 24-7 and landed in second place in the Big 12 Conference with a 13-3 mark.  
•    The Bears hosted first- and second-round matches of the NCAA Championship, defeating Miami (Ohio) and falling to Colorado.
•    BU has three returning All-Americans in Yossiana Pressley, Shelly Fanning and Hannah Lockin, and the trio of Bears were all named to the preseason All-Big 12 team.
•    Texas State leads the all-time series 28-17-2, but the Bears have taken 11 of the last 12 meetings dating back to 2001.
•    TXST's last victory against Baylor in Waco came on Sept. 14. 1990.

A LOOK AT LSU
•    LSU compiled a 20-10 record last season that included an 11-7 mark in the Southeastern Conference.
•    The Tigers finished fourth in the SEC and competed in the first round of the NCAA Championship.
•    Taylor Bannister was named to the Preseason All-SEC team, and LSU was picked fourth in the SEC Preseason Poll.
•    The Tigers lead the all-time series with Texas State 3-1. LSU has won the last three meetings, with the most-recent coming in 1989. The lone victory for Texas State in the series was in 1975.

THE DEBUT OF STRAHAN ARENA
•    The former Strahan Coliseum is currently undergoing multimillion dollar renovations that are all slated to be unveiled for the 2018-19 academic year.
•    The home of Texas State volleyball has been renamed Strahan Arena at the University Events Center.
•    The UEC is currently undergoing multimillion dollar renovations, with two major additions being a new court and videoboard. A new Conner Sports VIP court system is set to be installed inside Strahan Arena, which will replace the hardwood court that debuted in 1998. The project is being managed by Turner Construction & Quality Hardwood Floors, Inc.
•    A new Daktronics hi-definition 1080 6mm 13-by-21 feet four-sided video display now hangs from the rafters inside Strahan Arena. The video display has replaced the 16-by-9 feet 12mm videoboard and scoreboard that once hung on the Coliseum wall. Turner Construction & Daktronics managed this project.
•    The videoboard is already operational, while the playing surface will be installed prior to the Texas State home opener Aug. 30 against UTSA. The official grand opening of all UEC projects is slated for Family Weekend on Oct. 6, when Bobcat football hosts Louisiana.

THE CHISUM FILE
•    Texas State head coach Karen Chisum entered the 2018 season with 868 victories. That mark ranks 11th all-time, and she is the third-winningest active head coach.
•    Chisum earned her 800th career victory in 2014 and picked up win No. 850 last year.
•    The only other active head coaches with more wins are Penn State's Russ Rose (entered 2018 with 1,246 wins) and Florida's Mary Wise (905).
•    She is on pace to surpass other legendary coaches on the all-time wins list this season and could reach as high as No. 7 by season's end.

CHISUM INKS CONTRACT EXTENSION
•    Texas State Director of Athletics Dr. Larry Teis announced prior to the 2018 season that coach Karen Chisum has signed a contract extension.
•    The three-year deal will keep the longest-tenured Bobcat coach in San Marcos through the 2020 campaign.
•    Under Chisum's guidance, the Bobcats have won seven regular season conference championships and eight tournament championships.
•    Texas State also won the SBC West Division title in 2017 and earned its first postseason victory in school history in the first round of the National Invitational Volleyball Championship.

THE 2018 SCHEDULE
•    The Bobcats will compete 30 times overall this season, with 12 of those matches coming at home. They will also have 14 road matches and four tilts that will be contested on neutral-site courts.
•    Highlighting the slate are eight programs that competed in the postseason last year, including two teams that advanced to the quarterfinals of the 2017 NCAA Championship (Texas, Kentucky).
•    Four other opponents also competed in the NCAA tournament (Baylor, LSU, Marquette, Coastal Carolina), while two more played in the 2017 National Invitational Volleyball Championship (Rice, Arkansas State).

SEASON TICKET PACKAGES ANNOUNCED
•    The Texas State Athletics Ticket Office has announced season ticket packages for the 2018 Bobcat volleyball campaign.
•    All tickets are general admission, and they are on sale now for $40. Special groups such as Bobcat Club donors, Texas State faculty and staff, recent alumni (2014-18) and T-Association members can receive a special discounted rate of $30 per season ticket.
•    Patrons can renew their seats by logging into their online account at txstatebobcats.com/tickets, calling the Athletic Ticket Office at 512-245-2272, or by visiting the Athletic Ticket Office at Bobcat Stadium during normal business hours (M-F, 8 a.m.-5 p.m.).
•    Single-match tickets are also on sale.

TXST SITS ATOP PRESEASON POLL
•    Texas State sat atop the conference table with 70 points and 10 of 12 first-place votes. The designation marked the first time TXST earned the most votes in the preseason poll since joining the Sun Belt.
•    Arkansas State was second in the West Division with 58 points and one first-place vote, while Louisiana was picked third with 51 points and the final first-place tally.
•    Coastal Carolina, the two-time defending league tournament champions, was projected as the favorites in the Sun Belt East Division with 67 points and eight first-place votes. South Alabama was picked second with 63 points and the remaining four first-place votes, while Appalachian State nestled into third at 44 points.
•    The campaign is the third that the Sun Belt will utilize a divisional format. The Bobcats were picked second in the West in the first two iterations of the preseason poll.

TEXAS STATE LEADS ALL-SUN BELT PRESEASON TEAMS
•    Junior Micah Dinwiddie, the reigning Sun Belt Defensive Player of the Year, was voted as the 2018 Sun Belt Preseason Defensive Player of the Year.
•    She was joined on the All-Sun Belt team by seniors Madison Daigle, Megan Porter and Amy Pflughaupt. No other team in the league had more than two selections on the 12-player squad.
•    The four preseason selections were the most garnered by Texas State since becoming league members in 2013.
•    Dinwiddie is the first Bobcat to be named Sun Belt Preseason Defensive Player of the Year. This is also the second-straight year a Texas State player earned a preseason specialty award (Erin Hoppe, Setter of the Year).

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