Wolves open SAC play at Lenoir-Rhyne and Brevard

NEWBERRY - The Newberry Wolves kick the South Atlantic Conference volleyball season off this weekend, looking to improve on expected results and diving into the portion of the schedule which will help shape the push for the 2012 NCAA Tournament.

Newberry started the season off with five straight wins but dropped four matches at the Eckerd Classic last weekend. Three of those matches were against teams which have appeared in the AVCA Top 25 poll in the first three weeks of the season.

The Wolves' offensive attack is led by Samantha Parrish (Angola, Ind.), who has a SAC-leading 115 kills, ranks second in the league in kills/set and is 11th in the conference in digs per set. The 6-2 offense is run by Blair Browning (New Lexington, Ohio), who is 11th in the conference with 5.13 assists/set, and Rachel Moran (Cypress, Texas), who is 13th in the conference with 4.26 assists/set. Parrish and Moran are tied for the conference lead with 12 service aces apiece and Elyani Stokes (Houston, Texas) is eighth in the conference with 3.65 digs/set.

Newberry will travel to Lenoir-Rhyne for a 7 p.m. Friday start and closes the weekend with a 2 p.m. match Saturday at Brevard.

at Lenoir-Rhyne* (3-3 overall, 0-0 SAC), Friday, 7 p.m.
The conference's two Lutheran institutions square off with opposite trends running. L-R went 0-3 in its first tournament and 3-0 in its second tournament of the season. Overall, the Bears' matches have been tightly played as both L-R and opponents have recorded the same number of points.

Offensively, L-R is led by 2.75 kills/set from freshman Morgan Bunker, while fellow freshman Ashley Wells notches 2.13 kills per set. The Bears are also running a 6-2 with Meredith Lutz passing out 7.42 assists per set and Briana Gottberg handing out 5.5 assists per set. Four regulars average over two digs per set, but L-R's back row defense ranks seventh in the league in early play.

Live video and live stats for this match will be available at www.LRBears.com.

at Brevard* (6-0 overall, 0-0 SAC), Saturday, 2 p.m.
The Wolves will look to continue a string of dominance over the Tornados Saturday, as Newberry has not lost a match to Brevard since BC joined the SAC in 2007. Newberry has dropped only one set in total to the Western North Carolina squad.

BC is 6-0 entering its match against Anderson on Friday. Players to watch include Kortney Conner and Fatima Gharachorloo on the outside and setter Kayla Hanus.

As of Thursday, no multimedia is available for this match.