Golden Suns favored in GSC volleyball
Arkansas Tech’s volleyball team is unbeaten in Hot Springs over a longer span than American Pharoah at Oaklawn Park.
The Golden Suns return as two-time defending chammpion of the Great American Conference tournament, which starts today and continues through Saturday at Bank of the Ozarks Arena.
Top-seeded Arkansas Tech faces No. 8 seed Southeastern Oklahoma at 5 p.m. in the third of four first-round matches today. The Golden Suns, 25-6 overall, went 15-1 in regular-season conference matches, losing to Harding Nov. 10 in Searcy after defeating the Bisons in Russellville during an 18-match winning streak.
Tech is 11-1 in the GAC tournament, dropping only nine total sets, with its only defeat coming in a road match at Harding in the 2012 final. Since the tournament moved to a neutral setting two years ago, the Golden Suns have gone 6-0 with a pair of title in the Spa City.
“We’re excited to get down to Hot Springs,” said Tech coach Kristy Bayer. “We have four seniors who will be making their third trip to that arena and have played in GAC postseason play for four years. I think they really know the meaning of it, and having them is really going to help from a leadership standpoint.”
Repeating as conference regular-season champion, Tech defeated Southeastern Oklahoma 3-1 for a 9-2 advantage over the Savage Storm (7-22, 5-11) alltime. Freshman Hunter Eshnaur
turned in a season-high 20 kills on .386 hitting to go with 10 digs in that match, classmate Sarita Stegall (Fort Smith Southside) dishing out 50 assists and sophomore Madison Nagel posting 22 digs.
“Southeastern played us tough over at their place earlier this year,” Bayer said, “and I expect tough rounds in the first round, second round and the finals. At this point in the season, there’s no easy matches.”
Eshnaur, a Russellville High product, leads the GAC with 4.41 points per set and is third in kills at 3.82 and fourth with 41 total aces. Stegall is second with 10.44 assists and Nagel is fifth with 5.00 digs per set. Senior Katie Huff, from Springdale Har-Ber, led the conference with a .332 hitting percentage, ranking 12th in the conference with 2.84 digs while leading the team with 0.79 blocks per set.
Arkansas Tech has been pushed to five sets in conference matches by No. 4 seed Southern Arkansas (18-13, 9-7) at Magnolia and No. 2 seed Southern Nazarene (15-16, 11-5) in Bethany, Okla. SAU plays No. 5 seed Harding (15-15, 9-7) at 7:30 p.m., No. 2 Southern Nazarene facing No. 7 Ouachita Baptist (15-11, 8-8) after the noon opener between No. 3 Southwestern Oklahoma (19-11, 10-6) and No. 6 seed Northwestern Oklahoma (11-17, 8-8).
The Tech-Southeastern winner faces SAU or Harding in the second semifinal Friday, set for 6 p.m. Saturday’s 2 p.m. championship match determines the conference’s automatic bid to the[ NCAA Central Region field. Southern Nazarene took Arkansas Tech to five sets in last year’s conference-tournament championship match.
“Not to be looking ahead, but we know … to reach our goal and continue our season after this week, we need to win,” Bayer said. “So that’s also on our mind as we head down there.”
Admission daily is $6 for adults and $3 for students. The tournament is presented by Subway restaurants.