Volleyball team heads to SWCs seeded fourth

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by Jun Yang

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Waldron, the all-time Southwest Conference kill leader, was honored for her excellent performances in the past four seasons by the SWC, her teammates, her coaches and the fans.

Although the Stephen F. Austin Ladyjacks' players applauded for Waldron, they weren't as nice toward the team as they pounded the Owls 15-2, 15-10, 6-15, 15-10.

The Ladyjacks took 10-1, 7-1 and 5-0 leads in the first, second and fourth games, respectively, and never looked back.

The only bright side of the evening for the Owls came when Rice dominated game three with a superb .406 team hitting percentage while limiting SFA to six points.

Head Coach Henry Chen was not pleased with the match.

"We're being tested in these [recent] games, and we're not passing these tough tests," he said. "We lost our composure, and we made an outsized team seem like giants.

"They had 13 total blocks, which is a lot of blocks. We're not playing at a level we should."

While Chen challenged his team's consistency, he was quick to praise the Ladyjacks.

"I have to give Stephen F. Austin a lot of credit. They served really tough," he said. "We got hammered in game one, and then we came back, but unfortunately, they are a very good team.

"They are a playoff caliber team and are heading to the NCAA tournament. They showed us why tonight."

Rice overall had a weak offensive outing, hitting .147 for the match. Waldron, in her last game in Autry Court, tied for the team lead with 12 kills.

Sophomore quick hitter Tiffany Carrethers and junior play set hitter Jennifer Sloan tacked on 12 and 10 kills, respectively.

However, Carrethers and Waldron took 34 swings and Sloan only 26 to reach their double-digit kill totals.

Sophomore swing hitter Monika Bickert provided some spark off the bench with nine kills against only one error.

Last Saturday Rice failed to clinch third place in the SWC when it fell to Texas A&M University 14-16, 9-15, 8-15.

A&M outkilled Rice by 20, out-assisted them by 18 and outdug them by 11.

The loss dropped Rice to 19-10 and 4-6 in the SWC. The University of Houston Cougars climbed to third in the conference.

Sloan smashed 12 kills with a .417 percentage and anchored the defense with 10 digs. Carrethers had a field day at the net with nine blocks.

With last week's two losses, Rice fell to 19-11 overall. With its losing streak at three, Rice will begin its SWC tournament action against Houston at Hofheinz Pavilion.

Despite the losing skid, Chen is very optimistic about the team's chances to advance to NCAA tournament. Chen stressed many points to improve on in order to advance.

"The key to our season is that the players have to step up. We do need progress in teamwork and execution," he said. "There's never a question about our potential level of play. It just that we go through high and low points in a season, and unfortunately, we had many unfortunate losses stringing together lately.

"It's all part of the ups and downs of the season, but we'll be relentless the rest of the season," he said.

Rice can clinch a spot in the NCAA tournament by winning the SWC tournament. However, the tournament is definitely not the only route.

"Even if we don't win the SWC tournament, we still have a lot of good matches coming behind the SWC tournament. [The SWC tournament is] not do or die. We've lots of routes to [advance to NCAA tournament]," he said.

This item appeared in the Sports section of the November 17, 1995 issue.

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