CSULB
hosts NCAA Regional
By
Karl Peterson
On-line Forty-Niner
Long
Beach State and The Pyramid will host the
NCAA women's volleyball regional playoffs
this weekend.
Pepperdine,
University of Washington, Stanford and the
University of Minnesota will compete for
the chance to make the final four and eventually
the championship game.
The
matches start Friday with Stanford playing
Washington at 5:30 p.m. followed by Pepperdine
versus Minnesota at 7:30 p.m. The championship
game will feature the winners of Friday's
matches and be played Saturday at 7 p.m.
Pepperdine
(27-2) is the top ranked team in the regional
holding the No. 4 rank in the nation and
has not lost a match in its last 25. The
last time the Waves lost was to a mighty
USC team that is undefeated on the season
and the clear-cut favorite to win it all.
The
Waves made it to the regional by way of
winning the first and second round matches
against the University of Manhattan and
the University of Kansas which eliminated
Long Beach State in the first round.
Pepperdine's
players and coaches are the who's who of
the West Coast Conference. Katie Wilkins,
one of the best players in the nation, is
the three-time WCC player of the year and
head coach Nina Matthies is the three-time
defending WCC coach of the year. To round
out the list of WCC accolades, libero Christina
Hinds was named the defensive player of
the year.
Pepperdine
is the favorite for the regional and to
make it to its first women's volleyball
final four in the program's history.
The
Waves opponents, the Golden Gophers of Minnesota
(24-10), have been to four of the last five
sweet sixteens a feat that only nine teams
in the nation have accomplished with Stanford
and Pepperdine being two of the nine.
The
Washington Huskies (22-8, 10-8 Pac-10) will
play in the early match after finishing
fifth in the Pac-10, a great women's volleyball
conference. The Huskies are led by last
year's Pac-10 coach of the year Jim McLaughlin
and have won 20 games, a benchmark of success
in the sport, for two straight seasons.
The
Huskies opponent will be Stanford, one of
the most successful programs in women's
volleyball. Stanford (25-6, 14-4 Pac-10)
is making its 22nd sweet 16 appearance after
finishing in 2nd place in the Pac-10 behind
USC this season. The Cardinal team is led
by Ogonna Nnamani, Kristin Richards and
Jennifer Harvey, all of whom were named
to the first team all-Conference team in
the Pac-10.
The
other three regionals are being held this
weekend in Gainesville, Fla., Lincoln, Neb.
and Honolulu to decide the field for the
national title matches in Dallas Dec. 18-20.
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