Aug. 31, 2005
The Georgia Tech volleyball team, ranked 20th in the AVCA/CSTV Top 25 Preseason Coaches’ Poll, begins the 2005 season out west, participating in the Four Points University Plaza Wildcat Classic in Tucson, Arizona. The Yellow Jackets will open the year against Northwestern (1-0) Friday at 3 p.m. ET followed by a match-up against No. 17 Arizona at 10 p.m. On Saturday, the Jackets will play their final match of the tournament against Winthrop (2-0) at 8 p.m.
“This is a really strong tournament with several good teams in it and will be a good test for us to start the season,” said head coach Bond Shymansky who begins his fourth season as the head coach at Georgia Tech.
“We’ve had a good week of practice and while the excitement level has picked up, I think the anxiety level has, as well,” said Shymansky. “We have a number of new players to this year’s team, but we’ve had a good preseason and now it’s time to see how we compete as a team. We had a good scrimmage last week and feel like our team is ready and now we just have to test our ability to see where we are.”
Tech opens the tournament against Big Ten foe Northwestern, who return five starters to this year’s team and who picked up a victory last week over Wisconsin-Green Bay.
“We start off the weekend with Northwestern and Big Ten volleyball is something that is always pretty strong,” said Shymansky. “They are going to have six good players out on the court at all times and are a young team like we are, but they are a pretty big team, too. They have already played a match this season so they will have a little more experience just coming into the weekend.”
Following the match against Northwestern, Tech will face host Arizona Friday night. An NCAA participant a year ago, the Wildcats return five starters to this year’s lineup, including all-American Kim Glass.
“Arizona is the real deal and has a lot of great players returning this year,” said Shymansky. “I think that they are hungry to go out and really shake up the Pac-10 this year and we really respect them as a team,” said Shymansky. “We always feel like if we play strong competition like Arizona that it is a great measuring stick to see what we need to improve on as a team.”
On Saturday, the Jackets will face Winthrop, who advanced to the NCAA Tournament a year ago and who has won the Big South for three consecutive years.
“Winthrop is a very good program and are definitely an underestimated program,” said Shymansky. “We played against them last year and had a tough match on our home court and I’m sure it will be a different match on a neutral court this season. They have a lot of senior leadership, have a number of offensive weapons, are very well coached and they are going to bring a lot at us when we face them on Saturday.”
Tech returns four starters to its lineup, including all-American setter Lindsey Laband (Monument, Colo.), who lead the nation in assists a year ago, and ACC all-freshman selection Ulrike Stegemann (Schwerin, Germany). Also returning are Abby Showers (Vandalia, Ohio), who was fourth on the team in digs (269) last season, and Preseason All-ACC selection Jennifer Randall (Long Beach, Calif.), a three-year starter who was third on the team in digs (271) a year ago
New to the lineup this year will be sophomore Lindsey Gray (Lenexa, Kansas), who played in 13 matches and hit .312 a year ago and freshmen Callie Miller (Whitehouse, Ohio), who will start at middle blocker, and Talisa Kellogg (Westerville, Ohio) who will start as an outside hitter, both of whom were “Fab 50” selections by Volleyball Magazine. In addition both Laura DeMichelis (Aurora, Colo.) and Michelle Kandell (Mira Costa, Calif.) will see playing time, as well.
The Jackets are coming off a 27-7 season in which they won the ACC Regular Season and advanced to the Region Semifinals of the NCAA Tournament.
“This will be a tough weekend for us, but we don’t want to ever shy away from great competition,” said Shymansky. “This tournament has three good teams in it and we are anxious to see how our new players and our returning players that have different roles will respond to our team this year.”
Both of Tech’s matches on Friday can be heard on WREK radio on 91.1 FM and in streaming audio over the internet at www.wrek.org.
