University of Houston Athletics
Volleyball Preps for C-USA Championship
11/18/2009 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
Nov. 18, 2009
HOUSTON - The University of Houston volleyball team will meet Southern Miss in the first round of the Conference USA Championship on Friday night at 7 p.m. The Championship is being hosted by Rice University and will be played at Tudor Fieldhouse.
The Cougars enter the tournament as the No. 8 seed, while Southern Miss was the regular season champion and the top seed. The last time Houston as the eighth seed was in 2004 where they went on to finish 1-1.
Friday's contest will mark just the second time in league history that the Cougars have played Southern Miss in tournament action. The Golden Eagles knocked off UH 3-1 in 2007 in Huntington, W. Va.
UH is 18-12 all-time in C-USA Championship play, winning the tournament title in 1997.
With a win, Houston will advance to the second round against No. 4 Rice or No. 5 Marshall at 4 p.m. The Championship match is scheduled for a 1 p.m. start on Sunday. The match will air on CBS College Sports.
Gametracker will be available for all Cougar Championship matches by logging on to UHCougars.com.
Houston finished the regular season with a 9-22 overall record and a 6-10 mark in league action. Senior Kinsey Cave leads the team with 373 kills and freshman Chandace Tryon's 73 blocks are a team-high. Freshman Tara Roenicke's 1,016 assists also leads the squad.
For the third consecutive season, junior Amanda Carson paces the team in digs with 461. She pushes her career total to 1,322, which ranks as the fifth most in school history. Carson's season total also ranks eighth in the single season record books.
The Cougars have only met the Golden Eagles one time this season. It resulted in a 3-0 loss in Hattiesburg, Miss. In the loss, three Cougars reached double-digit kill totals, led by Cave with 15. Carson finished with a team-high 18 digs and freshman Tara Roenicke had 25 assists.
With the loss, Houston fell to 16-4 all-time against Southern Miss.
