LSU beach volleyball looks to continue their undefeated home streak this weekend in their last scheduled series of the season.
The Tigers have had a record-breaking season, but they’re not done yet. Their last series is the Battle on the Bayou featuring teams from inside the state. They’ll host Nicholls, New Orleans, ULM and Spring Hill. LSU goes into the match with the winning bets considering they’re ranked No. 4 and all of their opponents are unranked.
“We need to go out there and get the job done,” junior Claire Coppola said. “Just prepare for conference and nationals. We see it as another stepping stone to just work on things that we see we need to work on and find more wins along the line up.”
The competition is fairly low for the upcoming series. LSU holds a 21-5 overall record for the season with those losses being to Top-5 teams. Nicholls is yet to win a game this season out of the eight they’ve played. New Orleans holds more potential for competition as they hold a 10-8 record; however they’re currently sitting on a four game losing streak.
ULM seems to be the biggest competition of the weekend holding a 15-12 record. They have the most wins out of all of the hosted teams, but they also have the most losses. Spring Hill is sitting at 13-7and coming out of a one game winning streak going into the series. The Tigers are obviously the top competitor of the weekend, so they should be able to hold their record.
“It’s a little bittersweet,” coach Russell Brock said. “The end of the season is close. It’s undeniable now. This is the last time we get to play in this wonderful place before the end, but it’s also super exciting. We’re in a better position than we’ve ever been before with the inaugural season on the line this weekend. We want to finish that up well.”
This team has broken many record this season including their highest ranking in program history and their first home season undefeated. Some of the undefeated credit goes to the brand new facility the team has been playing in. This new on-campus facility really gave LSU students a chance to come and watch this team prosper.
This final weekend will help celebrate the seniors on all of their accomplishments through the program. For many it will be their final time to play beach volleyball with a team like this. It’s a bittersweet thing, but the Tigers mentality will overpower any emotions thrown their way. This whole season they’ve held a “one day at a time” mentality and it has paid off.
Brock said they can’t look forward to the championship until after this weekend. He said they have to handle business at home before they can worry about the other competition. This falls into the one day at time mentality that keeps the team going day to day. Their number one goal this weekend is to hold that undefeated record at their new facility.
“We’re super excited,” junior Kristen Nuss said. “Definitely excited for senior weekend this weekend. Our senior have done so much for this program and we’re super excited to honor them. Playing, we want to gain that confidence going into our conference tournament so coming out strong in every match we play this weekend is really key.”
