BATON ROUGE, La.-The LSU beach volleyball team is set to hold the Tiger Beach Challenge this weekend at Mango’s Beach Volleyball Club off of Sherwood Forest in the first home matches of 2016. The tournament will run from Saturday and Sunday, as the Lady Tigers will play host to four opponents with three of the four teams being ranked in the AVCA Collegiate Poll. LSU will play Louisiana-Monroe and No. 8 Stetson on Saturday, capping off the weekend with a match against No. 10 Georgia State and a rematch against No. 9 Florida International on Sunday.
“I think more than maybe any other year, it really does feel like home as far as a home court advantage,” said associate head coach Russell Brock. “We know our sand is tough to play in, but it’s what we’re used to. When we came back from Florida and started practicing this week, everybody just had that renewed energy and part of it comes from having a little taste of success, but a lot of it is knowing we’re back home and we’re looking forward to improving.”
The Lady Tigers (3-0) are coming off a weekend sweep of the FIU Beach Invitational that was highlighted by a 3-2 match win over then No. 5 Florida International on its home turf. No. 2 pair Lilly Kessler and Helen Boyle went undefeated in match play in Florida, as well No.4 tandem Cheyenne Wood and Mandi Orellana.
“That group of four, they all compete with each other,” said Brock. “There’s really no separation…they had a great weekend against good competition, and you need that out of the middle of the lineup.”
No. 3 duo Callan Molle and Cati Leak also tallied two of three matches in Fort Lauderdale and will enter the home tournament having won 12 of their last 14 matches.
LSU also boasts two pairs at the five spot who both earned points last weekend. Victoria Boraski and Megan Davenport earned a critical point for the Lady Tigers at the five slot against Florida International, while Riley Young and Jeni Clark garnered LSU’s first point of the season against Jacksonville.
“The five (spot) for us is so much deeper,” said Brock. “We probably have six people who could play in that five slot. Everybody gets to suit out this weekend, and we get some looks at who might end up playing. Hopefully, we can get some additional options for competition even deeper than five or six where we can see people compete against other schools.”
The Lady Tigers will play their first match against Louisiana-Monroe at 11 a.m. on Saturday.
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