OCR Text |
Show SU Volleyball Team opens Season An optimistic Southern Utah State College women's volleyball team jumps right into serious competition Friday and Saturday in its first week of action. The Thunderbird women opened the season earlier in the week at College of Eastern Utah, but the stiffest competition is expected ex-pected on the weekend at Pueblo, Colo., and the Northern Invitational. The Northern Invitational is one of three invitational tournaments which will r 7 . l.i. U I t make up the bulk of the SUSC schedule this year. The T-Birds will host the Western Invitational, and the Southern Invitational will also be held. In the Colorado tournament, tour-nament, SUSC will go against Metro State, Colorado College, Colorado Mines, and Regis in "pool" competition. The top three teams from each of three pools will compete Saturday in single elimination play to determine the tournament champion. "We have a good team this year; we should be better than last year when we won eight and lost only two," Joy Wood, SUSC volleyball coach, said. Last year SUSC tied with Idaho State for the conference con-ference championship and finished third in the region tournament. "We have more height because of some transfer talent coming in and more experience among our returning players than we did a year ago," Wood said. All three transfers bring height to the squad. Coming from Dixie College are Debbie Bone, 5-7 junior from St. George, and Chris Tea, 6-1 6-1 sophomore from Riverton. Kendra Smith, a 6-0 junior from Salt Lake City, has transfered from CEU. Letterwinners back from last season's team include Laura Bailey, Nephi, senior; Janet Halbert, Roy, sophomore; Dent Hendrix, Lund, Nevada, senior; Sydney Keel, Fillmore, junior; Pauline Nihipali, Laie, Hawaii, junior. Susan Pederson attended SUSC last year, but will try her hand at volleyball for the first time this season. Three freshmen round out the squad. They are Kelly Costley, Pahrump, Nevada; Natalie Smith, Ogden, and Debbie Whitebread, Boulder City, Nevada. . Following the Northern Invitational, SUSC will return to Cedar City for a Tuesday match with Dixie College. That match will start at 7 p.m. in War Memorial Fieldhouse. October 13, the T-Birds will host Snow College also at 7 p.m. |