The LSU beach volleyball team will travel to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to kickstart the season with the FIU Beach Invitational today.
The Tigers rank No. 19 in DiG Magazine’s 2016 Collegiate Sand Volleyball Preseason Poll, which was released on Feb. 1.
During the 2015 season the Tigers’ overall record was 14-9, and senior Katie Lindelow and sophomore Mandi Orellana headlined the Tigers’ pairings.
Lindelow and Orellana were invited to participate in the AFECAVOL Central American Cup, The FIVB World Championship and the Pan American Games. Both women have recently received CCSA All-Conference honors.
Lindelow hopes to return for a fifth season at LSU and said she can’t wait to play with Orellano, as well as the rest of her teammates.
“It was so much fun to play with her last year,” Lindelow said. “Her experience that she’s had playing in Guatemala for her national team was so important for her and really gave her kind of a leg up on everybody else coming in. She had these high pressure situations that she’d play in, and she taught me so much. I was the older one, but she taught me so much more than I could have imagined.”
Orellana returns this season after tearing her ACL in the 2015 FIVB World Championship during her first year at LSU and is more eager than ever to get back to playing with her team.
She will play the No. 3 seat with sophomore Cheyenne Wood, as well as blocking this year.
“I’m super excited to be back and to give everything I can to this team,” Orellana said. “I started to practice officially two months ago. I’ve been working really hard. Rehab has been really hard, and I’ve been doing my best of what I can control. Of course, I’ve been improving a lot. I’m getting used to the court, getting back with my teammates and they’ve been helping me so much.”
LSU returns to the sand with five freshmen: Addison Hoven, Maddie Ligon, Ashley Allmer, Megan Davenport and Jeni Clark. The newcomers also include transfer senior Roxanne McVey.
Veterans on the team include Riley Young, Lilly Kessler, Callan Molle, Victoria Boraski, Helen Boyle, Taylor Wilson, Emma Hiller, Carly Morris and Cati Leak.
“We’ve been training since August,” said LSU coach Russell Brock. “We’ve been working a lot on just improving our game. Last year, we had a really good year, and it was better than the first year, so our goal is to continue to progress every year. We’ve been really working on the skills of the game, and this year we’ve really been talking about kind of refining them and playing the game a little bit better.”
The Tigers open play against Jacksonville University at 8 a.m. and No. 5 Florida International at 11:30 a.m. today. The Tigers close the weekend with a game against the University of New Orleans on Saturday at 10 a.m.
You can reach Jourdan Riley on Twitter @jourdanr_TDR
LSU beach volleyball heads to Sunshine State to open 2016 campaign
By Jourdan Riley
March 3, 2016
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