Brunswick, Ga. – The College of Coastal Georgia women's volleyball team won a pair of three-set matches Friday as it opened play in the 2015 Fairfield Inn and Suites Mariner Invitational at Howard Coffin Gym.
The No. 20 Mariners (7-1) defeated Xavier 3-0 in their first match, toppling the Louisiana school by 25-20, 25-20, 25-16. The Mariners then capped the first day of the two-day event with another 3-0 victory over Bryan College, knocking off the Tennessee school by 25-20, 25-20, 20-17.
With the wins, the Mariners ran their record to 10-0 in the home invitational. Coastal Georgia was 4-0 in the first two tournaments in 2013 and 2014. The Mariners can go to 12-0 all-time in the Labor Day weekend extravaganza with two more wins on Saturday when the tournament resumes with six more matches starting at 9 a.m. and continuing throughout the day. Coastal Georgia is scheduled to face St. Thomas (Fla.) at 3 p.m. and will close out the tournament with a 7 p.m. match against Bethel (Ind.)
Coastal Georgia head coach Jeff Huebner was pleased with his team's play on Friday.
"I thought we did a good job protecting our home court and playing in a way that we could get a lot of kids some playing time," he said. "I'm just really appreciative of how good this tournament is. It's good competition for us before we go into conference play. Six of our first 10 matches this season will have been against teams that are ranked or are receiving votes for the Top 25."
Coastal Georgia was coming off an open week when it took the court for its Friday tournament opener. The Mariners had not played since competing in Bryan's home tournament on Aug. 21-22, when they defeated Indiana Wesleyan, which opened the season ranked No. 17, and also knocked off the host Lions and St. Catharine (Ky.), two teams receiving votes in the first poll of the season.
Against Xavier, which has made the last four NAIA tournaments, the Mariners hammered home 46 kills in 97 total attacks to hit .472 for the match as a team.
Two players – Allie Shannon and Kyra White – led the Coastal Georgia attached with 10 kills each. White actually posted her double-digit total in 15 swings to hit a whopping .668 in the match which was her home debut for the Mariners.
Regan Coughlin added eight kills for the Mariners. Coughlin also had four service aces. Kara Neisen recorded six kills.
Cayley Meiners recorded 37 assists in the three-set win.
Alyssa Keeve led a balanced defensive effort with 11 digs, Meiners followed with nine, Coughlin added eight and Neisen had seven.
The Mariners recorded eight total blocks. Shannon led the team with 2.5 as she finished with three block assists and one solo block.
In the nightcap against Bryan, the Mariners were certainly efficient offensively, getting down 41 kills in 82 attacks for a .500 hitting percentage. The offense was balanced, too. White again topped the team with 10 kills in 17 swings, Emma Anderson and Coughlin followed closely with nine kills each while Neisen and Shannon both had five apiece.
Meiners dished out 36 assists.
"Emma just played great," Huebner said, "and Cayley is obviously always impressive. We're setting about 40 percent of the time to our (middle hitters) and that's challenging for the other team. You can see it in most of our matches by the third set, they're just guessing where we're going. That's just making us better because our outside hitters are also hitting really well from the pins."
The Mariners were equally impressive defensively, finishing with 51 team digs and 10.5 total blocks. Alyssa Keeve led the defensive effort with 15 digs, Neisen had 10 and Meiners followed with nine.
"Defensively, we're trying for 15 to 17 digs a set. We had right at 15 in the first match and 17 in the second one," Huebner noted. "Alyssa has been really impressive. She had shoulder surgery in January and has worked really hard since then. I couldn't be happier for her."
Shannon and Coughlin led the Mariners with three blocks each. Shannon had two solos.
"I like the way we're blocking. Once we figure a team out, we're blocking from everywhere," Huebner said.
Huebner also lauded the play of several players who shined in limited action including Alexis Downey, Hannah Mitchell and Carly Bland.
For complete tournament results, click here.
