BATON ROUGE, La. – Eight days away from their season opener, the LSU volleyball team hosted its annual clinic for kids and Purple & Gold scrimmage Thursday evening inside the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
Seen as one of the final events before the start of the regular season, the Tigers split into two squads and played in front of more than 500 in attendance on Thursday, as the Gold team took all three sets on the night with scores of 25-22, 25-22 and 25-23.
The players rotated between both squads and got solid performances throughout, unofficially getting double-digit kill performances from Gina Tillis and Mimi Eugene who had 10 each. On the night, five different players had at least five kills in the contest including Katie Lindelow turning in nine, Khourtni Fears with seven and Brittany Welsh with six.
On the Purple side, setter Elly Ogle served up 32 assists, earning two kills and five digs, while freshman Lindsay Flory had 23 with two kills, no errors, and three digs.
Defensively, senior Haley Smith led the team with 13 digs, while also serving up two assists, while Lindelow had 11 and Tillis had 10 for the double-double.
The Gold team outpaced the Purple side 9.0-3.0 in blocks, as senior Emily Ehrle and junior Tiara Gibson had three each. Fears and Ogle each tied for two for the Purple team.
Eugene had two of the Purple team’s four service aces, while Smith and Lindelow had one each, with Cheyenne Wood and Toni Rodriguez having the only two for the Gold team.
Before the Tigers put on a spirited show for those in attendance, the team hosted its kids clinic beforehand with over 150 kids participating in the nearly two-hour session. The clinic, which was free to all kids in the eighth grade and below, was set up with various stations throughout the arena as the players demonstrated the different drills and practice routines that the student-athletes use during the week and before games.
LSU opens the 2015 regular season next Friday, August 28 at 2:30 p.m. against UC Irvine to open the American Campus Classic hosted by the University of Texas. All three matches for the Tigers will be shown on the Longhorn Network at WatchESPN.
For all of the latest news and information on Tiger volleyball, visit www.lsusports.net/volleyball. Fans can also follow the program on its social media outlets at www.Facebook.com/lsuvolleyball along with @lsuvolleyball and @lsucoachfran on Twitter and @lsuvb on Instagram.