Gamecocks Open Season at Florida State Tournament

TALLAHASSEE, FLA. – South Carolina beach volleyball begins its season with a two-day tournament at Florida State, running Saturday and Sunday in Tallahassee. The Seminole Beach Bash pits the 13th-ranked Gamecocks against No. 7 Cal Poly, No. 16 TCU, Houston Baptist and the host Seminoles, ranked second in the country. Live stats will be available all weekend, be sure to also follow @GamecockBeachVB for updates and results.

2019 SEASON NOTABLES

• The team finished the program’s sixth season with a 20-11 overall record, the fourth 20-win season in a row.
• With a win over Texas A&M-Kingsville on April 6, the program won its 100th dual all-time.
• Highlighting the season were wins over No. 2 Southern Cal and No. 4 LSU – the first two wins over top-five-ranked opponents in program history. 
• Individually, Lydia Dimke and Katie Smith earned AVCA Top Flight honors out of the number two position in the lineup, accumulating a 23-7 record in the twos.
• Seniors Cadie Bates and Shannon Williams became the first Gamecock pair to ever earn CCSA All-Conference postseason honors after finishing the year with 17 wins at the number one position.
• Williams closed her four-year career with 76 dual wins, making her just the second in program history to move past 75 career wins. Closing the academic year, Williams earned South Carolina’s Student-Athlete of the Year award, given to one Gamecock with standout accomplishments as an athlete, student and citizen.
• Along with Dimke and Smith, Franky Harrison and Hannah Edelman each cracked the 20-win mark for the season. Harrison won all 20 duals in the number three pairing; Edelman went 7-2 at number three and 13-7 at number four in a comeback season after her sophomore campaign was cut short by injury.

SCOUTING #7 CAL POLY
The Mustangs have been full speed ahead through four seasons under head coach Todd Rogers, peaking last year with 25 wins and a spot in the NCAA tournament field after being seen as a team that was snubbed of postseason aspirations in 2018. The Gamecocks opened last season against Cal Poly as well, which was the first meeting ever between the two programs. The Mustangs see Crissy Jones move from the number one pairing to the coaching box for 2020, but Jones’ partner last season – Tia Miric – returns as a reigning All-American as just a junior. The team’s will not lack depth, as it brings back seven all-conference honorees from last season. Experience won’t be an issue as well, with intact 2019 pairs Macy Gordon and Emily Sonny (16-3 at No. 2) and Brayden Gruenewald and Vanessa Roscoe (16-11 overall) combining with Miric and UCLA transfer Torrey Van Winden, who played just four duals for Cal Poly before missing the rest of the season with an injury.

SCOUTING HOUSTON BAPTIST
2020 is year five for Houston Baptist as a beach program, the Huskies finished with an 18-11 record last season. It will be an important year for the team, as the Southland Conference is sponsoring beach volleyball as a championship sport for the first time, and Houston Baptist made an early statement last season when it finished the season with eight conference dual wins in a span of three days at the Southland Showcase tournament. The pairs will be led by a strong core of returners, starting at the top with Tori Hinojosa, who went 17-6 at number one last season but did lose her partner to graduation. Natalie Bennett has a similar scenario on court two, compiling nine of her 13 total wins for the year with departed grad transfer Bailey Banks. Senior Danielle Wheeler will be looked to as a leader after finishing 18-5 as an individual last year in the fifth position. Finally, sophomore Maddie Butters comes in as another player to watch, after compiling 16 wins in year one as a Husky (13 on court four).

SCOUTING #16 TCU
TCU begins the spring as a favorite to have a breakout year, building off a program-record 18 wins in 2019 with a challenging schedule. The Horned Frogs bring a talented crop of newcomers to a roster that already has a wealth of experience. Three 20-game winners highlight the veterans on the roster: Avery Arellano went 23-10, Taylor Bradley had 12 of her 21 wins come from the number two flight, and Hailey Brockett predominantly competed alongside Arellano to go 22-8 (20-8 at number five). The team’s fate ultimately may lie with its newcomers; TCU added LSU transfer Olivia Byer and six freshmen who are accomplished junior players, most notably Spanish U19 national team member Daniela Alvarez.

SCOUTING #2 FLORIDA STATE
The Seminoles check in at No. 2 in the AVCA’s preseason coaches poll, coming off a 29-7 record and four-consecutive CCSA conference championship in 2019. Florida State returns six starters who finished last year with 25 wins or more, led by Payton Caffrey’s 31. Junior Alaina Chacon earned preseason All-America team recognition, and Madison Fitzpatrick – her 2019 partner – joined her as a preseason All-American on CollegeBeachVB.com’s list. Kate Privett, Molly McBain and Sara Putt round out the top returners, and the Seminoles also put three freshmen on the AVCA High School Beach Volleyball All-American Team: Madelyne May Anderson (first team), Liz Waters-Leiga (second team) and Kera Rutz (second team).

QUOTABLE: HEAD COACH MORITZ MORITZ
On the Seminole Beach Bash’s field of teams…
“I don’t think there’s a better way to set the tone for our season than with a tournament of this caliber. This may be our first weekend, but these are teams we will be competing with for postseason bids all season long.”

GAMECOCKS IN THE NATIONAL RANKS
The team earned its first-ever ranking by the AVCA on March 6, 2017, and have not left the polls since. South Carolina stands at 13th in the preseason coaches poll, marking 31 consecutive polls in a row. The lone poll that put the Gamecocks outside of the top 15 was the final rankings for 2019. Coming into the season, 13 Gamecock opponents are currently ranked in the top 20, including eight of the top ten, and five other 2020 opponents are receiving votes.

VASTINE LOOKS TO BUILD OFF SOLID SOPHOMORE SEASON
Junior Jess Vastine may very well be the most seasoned student-athlete South Carolina has seen as a department, as the Wittman, Ariz. native begins her sixth season as a Gamecock in the spring. Vastine is the team’s lone crossover athlete, playing in all 114 sets for the indoor team this past fall. She set career highs in every major statistical category indoors, became just the fourth different Gamecock in the last decade to surpass 200 kills and 200 digs in a season, and helped the team reach 20 wins and the second round of the NCAA tournament.

The indoor success came on the heels of Vastine’s breakout season on the beach in 2019. In year two, she made the biggest year-to-year jump in program history, going from five wins in 2018 as a freshman to 19 wins as a sophomore. Of those 19 wins, 16 came in the No. 4 pair, six came against conference rivals and four came against ranked opponents. Vastine’s signature win came in the team’s 3-2 upset of No. 2 Southern Cal, when she teamed with Hannah Edelman to win a three-set match at the fours. She ended the spring of 2019 on an even hotter streak, winning seven of the last nine matches, highlighted by wins over No. 20 TCU and No. 16 Georgia State.

SENIOR QUARTET LEADS THE CHARGE IN YEAR FOUR
While the team lost some important leaders from 2019’s roster, four seniors are entering their final seasons with plenty of experience to fill those shoes. Franky Harrison, Carly Schnieder and Katie Smith have been in the starting lineup since day one on campus, and each enter 2020 with over 50 career dual wins. The fourth four-year member, Hannah Edelman, emerged in the lineup as a sophomore and owns a career winning percentage of .682 with 30 dual wins. Smith’s 67 dual wins through three seasons puts her within striking range of Macie Tendrich’s program record of 93; Tendrich and Shannon Williams are the only Gamecocks to have surpassed 75 career wins. Schnieder’s 64 wins ranks her fifth in program history, and Harrison’s 51 dual wins is good for seventh.

GRAD CHANCE U
South Carolina welcomed its first grad transfer in 2015, when Jade Hayes came to Columbia from UCF. In the years since, the Gamecocks have one of the best track records in the country when it comes to developing indoor players for the beach game. Entering 2020, the team’s seven grad transfers – Jade Hayes (UCF), Katie Zimmerman (Wichita State), Adrianna Culbert (Colorado State), Leah Perri (Clemson), Cadie Bates (Duke), Lydia Dimke (Creighton) and Lauryn Gillis (Wisconsin) have accumulated a combined record of 190-90 (.679).    

This season, two new indoor standouts make their way to Wheeler Beach. Madison Brabham was a crossover athlete with Texas A&M-Kingsville, earning All-America conference player of the year honors as a senior for the indoor team but also claiming AVCA Top Flight honors after going 22-8 overall and 21-5 in the No. 2 flight for the Javelinas’ beach team in 2019. Morgyn Greer has a juniors beach volleyball background, but played indoor exclusively for four seasons at Florida, playing in 54 career matches. The Gators reached the National Semifinal in 2017 and Sweet 16 in 2018 and 2019, and won 26 or more matches in each of Greer’s four seasons.

SMITH WINNING THE HARD WAY
Entering her final season as the team’s active career wins leader, Katie Smith has earned her place in the program’s record book. The West Chester, Ohio native has 67 dual wins through her first three seasons, already ranking her fourth in program history, and her .698 winning percentage in duals puts her second all-time (min. 30 duals). What has been impressive about those totals has been how she has earned it; of Smith’s 96 career duals, 33 have come at the number one position and 62 have come at number two. Smith’s 20 career wins at number one is the second-most in program history, and her 46 wins at number two is far and away the program’s best. Her success at the top of the lineup has garnered Smith AVCA Top Flight honors in 2018 and 2019.

FRESHMEN CLASS OFFERS KEY DEPTH FOR 2020 ROSTER
Six true freshmen will press South Carolina’s returners for playing time this spring, with each bringing a unique background and skill set to the roster. Ashley Brasfield and Kaeli Crews were named to the AVCA’s High School Beach All-America teams, which were released in September. There are now five past or present honorees on the roster, and South Carolina has six total in the six years the award has existed – Brasfield, Crews, Abby Carroll, Julia Mannisto, Carly Schnieder and Katie Smith.

Brasfield, a native of Kennesaw, Ga., played indoor at Harrison High School and club at Southern Sand Select. She won three tournaments as a high school senior and finished no worse than fifth in any tournament in 2019. Crews comes to South Carolina from Winter Garden, Fla. and played club for Cape Coast. Aside from helping her high school teams win indoor and beach state championships, Crews won the USA Volleyball Florida State championship and placed top-10 in 11 tournaments during the 2018-19 season. 

Skylar Allen (Callisburg, Texas) lettered in four sports in high school along with a stellar club beach resume; she ended her prep career by winning the Rox VB National Championship in the summer of 2019. Fellow Texan Sophie Manson (McKinney, Texas) played in AVPFirst beach tournaments with current teammate Abby Carroll and also trained with USAV High Performance for indoor, competing with it at U19 world trials in 2017. Peyton Gray (Herndon, Va.) is also a veteran indoor athlete through high school, but also claimed top-three finishes at the AVP, USAV, ESPL and AAU junior national tournaments for beach. Last, but not least, is local product Eliza Epps (Lexington, S.C.), who played at River Bluff High School and brings high athleticism to the sand. 

AMBITIOUS 2020 SCHEDULE SET TO CHALLENGE CAROLINA
Loaded schedules have become the standard for South Carolina, and 2020 may go down as its toughest yet. Currently, 13 Gamecock opponents are ranked in the AVCA coaches top 20 poll in the preseason, including eight of the top ten, and five other 2020 opponents are receiving votes. Looking back at the eight-team NCAA tournament field from 2019, the Gamecocks are set to face six of the participants, including national finalist Southern Cal and national semifinalist LSU. In total, South Carolina’s 29-game schedule pits it against teams that are currently ranked 17 times.

“I’m excited about this year, we have a deep roster where any one person can be equally successful no matter the position in the lineup, nor the partner they pair with,” head coach Moritz Moritz said. “We need to step up to the challenge that this schedule offers. The sport is deeper than it’s ever been, so we need to enter every match knowing that we need to be locked in no matter who we face.”

ALL-TIME RECORDS

• South Carolina holds a 106-66 all-time program record, dating back to 2014.
• The Gamecocks joined the CCSA for volleyball in 2016, and have an all-time conference record of 32-20.
• In home matches at Wheeler Beach, Carolina is 51-17 (.735).
• Moritz Moritz is entering his seventh season as head coach of the Gamecocks, spanning the entire young history of the program. He earned his 100th career win against Texas A&M-Kingsville on April 6, 2019.