BATON ROUGE — After sweeping Georgia on Friday, the LSU volleyball team looks to extend its winning streak to seven matches as the Tigers host No. 5 Florida on Sunday at 1:30 p.m. in the Maravich Center.
The match will be televised on tape delay at 8:30 p.m. on Cox Sports Television (Baton Rouge cable channel 37).
LSU (9-1, 1-0 SEC) will look to snap the Gators NCAA record 131 consecutive regular season conference match-winning streak. Florida (9-1, 1-0 SEC) has not lost a regular season Southeastern Conference match since a 3-1 loss to South Carolina on Nov. 13, 1994.
The Tigers became the first team this season to sweep Georgia on Friday night, defeating the Bulldogs, 3-0. Georgia’s previous two losses of the season were in four games to top 10-ranked teams.
“Georgia is a big physical team, they are athletic, big and physical like Florida,” said LSU head coach Fran Flory. “We were able to keep Georgia out of its rhythm and keep some of their better players out of the match and that gave us some confidence going into the tomorrow’s match.”
Junior Ivana Kuzmic leads LSU with 3.30 kills per game, while hitting at a team-best .336 clip. The middle blocker also ranked 11th in the NCAA in blocks per game with 1.65. Regan Hood and Jelena Mijatovic join Kuzmic at averaging over three kills per game, recording 3.19 and 3.21 respectively. Against Georgia, Mijatovic led the Tigers with 17 kills, while Hood led the team with four blocks.
Senior Rachel Pittman leads the team with 3.24 digs per game. The libero has posted five double-figure digs matches, including four consecutive. Against Miami, she recorded the fourth-most digs in a five-game match in LSU history with 26.
Florida is led by Jane Collymore with 5.32 kills per game, while Sherri Williams leads the Gators with 1.38 blocks per game and a .354 hitting percentage.
The Gators’ only loss of the season was a five-game defeat to No. 1 Minnesota, falling 17-15 in the fifth game. Florida lost just two matches last season on its way to the National Championship game. The Gators lost to national champion Southern Cal to open the 2003 season and in the National Championship game.
LSU has not defeated Florida since 1991, one of the Gators’ two regular season SEC losses since 1990. Florida has dominated the league over the last 13 seasons as the Gators have won over 90 percent of their matches overall and finished ranked in the top 15 each of those years, including seven top five finishes.
Next weekend, LSU will host Mississippi State and Ole Miss in the Maravich Center. The Tigers will take on the Bulldogs on Friday at 7 p.m., while facing the Rebels on Sunday at 1:30 p.m.