Arkansas Volleyball Fact Sheet #1

Arkansas returns 10The Lady Razorbacks return nine players including four starters for the 2007 season. The returners are Destiny Clark, Kelli Cole, Caira Daugherty, Jessica Dorrell, Catherine Fowler, Christina Lawrence, Nicole Martin, Ashley Miller, Lindsay Scanlan and Kristin Seaton. The starters are Dorrell, Lawrence, Scanlan and Miller.
Arkansas has one of its biggest classes of newcomersThe Lady Razorbacks welcome a class of six newcomers to start the 2007 season. Although the six are new to the fans and media, a couple are pretty familiar with the team. Yun (Karen) Tang, Sarah Freudenrich and Heather Royal all joined the team at semester in January and have gone through the spring workouts. Phoebe Bautista, Lauren Feilding and Hillary McCormick all arrived on campus this summer and worked Chris Poole’s summer camps.
Arkansas opens at homeThe Lady Razorbacks host the Arkansas Clarion Inn Invitational Aug. 24-25 to open the 2007 season. Arkansas has played its first match of the season at home four times winning three of those contests. The last time Arkansas opened at home was in 2005 when the Lady’Backs hosted the Arkansas Invitational. The Lady’Backs defeated North Texas in three games en route to a three-match winning streak to start the year.
Arkansas in home openersThe Lady Razorbacks are 12-1 all-time in their Barnhill Arena home openers with the lone loss coming in 2004 against Kansas.
Arkansas in home tournamentsThe Lady Razorbacks have hosted several home tournaments since adding volleyball for the 1994 season. Arkansas is 49-16 all-time in home tournament matches. That mark includes a 4-2 record in NCAA Tournament matches and a 4-2 record when hosting the SEC Tournament.
Arkansas is the SEC’s odd team outThe SEC has 11 teams that sponsor volleyball (Vanderbilt does not have a team). Each year there is one team who does not rotate through the conference schedule with a travel partner. This year, that team is Arkansas. As a result, the Lady Razorbacks do not play a mid-week conference match. In fact, Arkansas has only one match this year that does not fall on a weekend and that is a Tuesday match against Oral Roberts Aug. 28. It also means that instead of facing Mississippi and Mississippi State in the same weekend or Alabama and Auburn, the schedule is much more varied – and travel is much more interesting.
Another SEC reminderThe SEC eliminated the conference tournament last year instead opting for a double-round robin format in which teams play each other twice during the course of the season. That format continues for the 2007 season.
Poole returns for 14th seasonArkansas head coach Chris Poole enters his 14th season at the helm of the Lady Razorbacks. Poole is the only coach Arkansas has ever known and he has guided the Lady’Backs to a 304-142 record during his tenure. Holly Watts returns has Poole’s associate head coach and the Lady’Backs welcome the addition of Gokhan Yilmaz who joins the team as an assistant coach this fall.
Martin returns to rosterJunior Nicole Martin returns to the Arkansas roster this year after redshirting the 2006 season. Martin attended Ball State last year moving back to Indiana to be closer to her family. She is expected to challenge Caira Daugherty and Lindsay Scanlan for time as the team’s setter this year.
Also returningSophomore Kristin Seaton returns to the lineup in 2007 as well. The Fort Smith, Ark., native was injured in summer ATV accident in 2006 and was unable to play last year.
Challenging schedule awaitsArkansas faces a tough non-conference schedule before jumping into the teeth of the Southeastern Conference rotation in mid-September. The Lady’Backs open with a home tournament followed by a match with NCAA Tournament participant Oral Roberts Aug. 28. Back-to-back tournaments following with the Lady’Backs traveling to Virginia for the first time in program history. They face Temple, Norfolk State and Virginia. Next the Lady’Backs head to Manhattan, Kan., for tournament play facing the host Wildcats along with Fresno State and Northern Iowa. The Lady’Backs then begin a home-and-away series with each of the SEC teams. Seven SEC teams including Arkansas made trips to the NCAA Tournament last year and most return significantly more offense than Arkansas. Those teams are Ole Miss, LSU, Alabama and Tennessee who, along with Arkansas, made it to the first round; Kentucky who advanced to the second round and Florida who was a regional finalist.
Arkansas picks up TV matchAlthough the Lady Razorbacks were not selected for an SEC match of the week, Arkansas is still making a television appearance. Sun Sports will pick up the Fayetteville match between the Lady Razorbacks and Florida. More details will follow on the times and talent.
Can I get on the internet please? Every Lady Razorback volleyball match will be carried on the internet in some capacity this year. Every Lady Razorback home match will have live stats, a live audio broadcast and a live video broadcast of the event. Fans can find those at LADYBACKS.COM. All road SEC matches will have audio on LADYBACKS.COM and most will have live stats on either the host site or LADYBACKS.COM. The radio broadcasts for all road SEC matches can also be heard in the Fayetteville area on KXUA, 88.3 FM.
Lady’Backs tabbed third in SEC WestArkansas was picked to finish third in the Southeastern Conference’s Western Division the league office announced Tuesday, Aug. 14. Arkansas finished the year 16-13 last year and made its fourth consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance in 2006. The Lady’Backs return 10 players from last year’s team and welcome six newcomers for the 2007 season.