LSU beach volleyball jumpstarts their season Feb. 16 with their annual Purple vs. Gold scrimmage in their brand new facility.
This weekend has been much awaited for the Tigers. The team has been practicing in the new facility since January and cannot wait to get fans inside. The scrimmage will allow the team to fine tune some areas they’ve been working hard on. Even though it’s technically just a formal practice, a lot can come from it and the team has high hopes.
“I think it’s all about building toward what we’re gonna be doing,” coach Russell Brock said. “It’s just the next step. We’re getting to put on uniforms, we’re getting to compete against somebody across the net that’s wearing a different colored jersey, yeah it’s ours, but it’s still the next step.”
“This is the first time that the public has been invited to come in and cheer and experience what we’re doing on campus so it’s a big milestone.It’s definitely a step toward us being prepared and ready to do the real deal.”
This is the first time the Tigers will play since the NCAA Championship. Since then, the team’s depth has increased dramatically by bringing 12 returning players, six freshman, two graduate transfers and three seniors from the LSU volleyball team. They were also just named No. 7 in the AVCA Preseason Poll.
This year the Purple vs. Gold scrimmage will be played more like a match due to the depth of the team. There will be two teams, Purple and Gold, with two rounds of matchups. Whoever wins the most sets, wins the scrimmage.
“We’re really limited on what we can do from the NCAA perspective,” Brock said. “I think this year because of how many people we have and because of how we deep we are, we’re able to do it more like a match, which is something we’ve never been able to do before. Each year the only options you have is to do a scrimmage or an alumni match.
“We really don’t have enough to do a alumni match yet, so the scrimmage has been oor final tune up. This is the best opportunity for a final tune up that we’ve had. It’s a little bit different format, it’s a little more competitive. It’s gonna look more like a match.”
The team is eager to play the scrimmage and hopefully find out the lineup soon after. Last season sophomore Hunter Domanski and junior Olivia Powers were paired up and went 15-11 in the USAV Collegiate Beach Championship. It has not yet been announced if they will be paired up this season.
“When we get to play together in practice it’s just such a fun throwback but were to sure about the lineup this year,” Powers said. “But it’s been fun because we’ve done so many different matchups and we’re all really versatile this year. That gives us a lot of different options and looks so I’m excited to see what the lineup is gonna be.”
LSU looks to pack out the new facility come scrimmage morning and see what can be improved before the season starts. The Tigers will start their regular season Feb. 23 in Tallahassee, Fla.
“We wanna see if they excel,” Brock said. “But we also know that we could see some different things than we’ve seen up until this point because we’ve never really competed in here, in that environment. So it’s gonna be different, it’s gonna be fun. We expect to see some different things and we wanna see people elevate their game.”
