Aug. 24, 2007

Box Score

HOUSTON - Led by a trio of sophomores, the Lamar University volleyball team opened the 2007 season in style Friday afternoon, winning a five game thriller over Oral Roberts in the opening game of the Mizuno Invitational hosted by Rice University in Houston.

The Lady Cards blasted out of the gates early in the match, winning the opener 30-19, but ORU quickly responded by winning game two 30-26 and squeezing out a 32-30 win in game three. With their backs against the wall, Lamar rallied back for a 30-24 win in game four and closed out the match by taking game five 15-11.

This is the first season-opening win for the Lady Cardinals under the direction of head coach Justin Gibert. In his first two seasons Lamar fell to Tulsa and Tulane. It is also the first win in a season opener for the Lady Cards since the 2003 season when they defeated UT-Pan American.

"Our team is very excited about starting the season with a win," Gibert said. "It was also important for us to win against a team that won their conference and went to the NCAA Tournament last year. The win showed a lot of character and was a total team effort."

The Lady Cardinals were led by sophomore setter Adrianne Meengs triple-double, as she passed out 48 assists, knocked down 13 kills with a .379 hitting percentage and scooped up 11 digs. Also having a solid performance was sophomore outside hitter Kaci Brewer who posted a double-double with a team-high 14 kills and 13 digs.

Sophomore middle blocker Lauren Holdorff had a strong offensive performance for the Lady Cards, knocking down 11 kills with a .231 hitting percentage, while freshman outside hitter Genevieve Gladle stepped up with nine kills and 14 digs. Junior Meagan Adams also came up big with seven kills and a team-high .400 hitting percentage. Defensively Lamar was led by junior libero Andrea Hamilton, who collected a team-high 22 digs.

Gibert said the way Meengs, Brewer, Holdorff and Gladle played in keying the Lady Cards to victory is a good sign of how the team is developing in his third season.

"From day one our strategy has been to build this thing from the ground up," he said. "With this win, we are starting to see the fruits of our strategy pay off."

As a team the Lady Cardinals hit .200 for the match, while ORU hit .184. Lamar finished the match with 10 service aces and 10 service errors, while the Golden Eagles had eight aces and 14 service errors. The two teams were close to even in blocks, as ORU finished with 12 and LU finished with 11.

Oral Roberts was led by Jackie Oliveria and Janete Ferreira who had 19 and 18 kills respectively, while Juliane Vieria passed out a match-high 55 assists.

Lamar will be back in action of Saturday afternoon when they take on Rice at 12:30, followed by Louisiana Tech at 4:30 p.m.