ARKADELPHIA, Ark. – The Southern Arkansas volleyball team kicked off their 2013 season on Friday as they played in a pair of matches on the first day of the Lady Reddie Classic held on the campus of Henderson State in Arkadelphia.
 
SAU experienced mixed results in their first action of the year as they fell to Christian Brothers 3-1 in their first match of the day, but the Lady Muleriders (1-1) would bounce back in a big way in their evening match as they defeated Southwest Baptist in three sets to pick up their first win of 2013.
 
In their opener, the Lady Muleriders fell behind two sets to none as they ran into a hot-hitting Christian Brothers team that racked up 24 kills and committed just five attack errors through the first two sets. Conversely, the Lady Muleriders would manage only 10 kills while having nine attack errors in that time. The Lady Muleriders would show some resolve, however, in the third set as they had their best hitting set of the match while also capitalizing on 11 errors by CBU to force a fourth set.
 
In that fourth set, the Lady Muleriders and Lady Bucs played each other closely early on as the score was knotted up on several occasions. With the set gridlocked at nine-all, CBU would go on a five-point streak to take a 14-9 lead. The Lady Muleriders would fight back to make the score 15-12 before CBU opened their lead back out by scoring three straight points to take an 18-12 lead. A quick four-point run by SAU pulled the Lady Muleriders to within two points, 18-16, but CBU would score seven of the next eight points to secure the set and the match victory.
 
Exhibiting the resilience showed in the third set of their first match, SAU came out and played well in their second match of the day, this one against Southwest Baptist. In the first set against SBU, the Lady Muleriders' offense was clicking as they hammered home 15 kills and hit at a clip of .286 en route to a 25-23 win in the set. The plus hitting would continue in the second set as the Lady Muleriders hammered home 17 kills in the set as they closed out a 25-20 win. With a two sets to none advantage, SAU would keep their earlier pace as they notched 15 more kills in the set as they were able to close out the straight sets win over Southwest Baptist.
 
In the match against SBU, the Lady Muleriders totaled 47 kills and hit a clip of .241. Newcomer Amanda Monge was the top attacker as she collected 13 kills on 20 attacks with one error for a hitting percentage of .600. Freshman Hailey McNee was not far behind Monge in kills as she tallied 10 kills. McNee also came away with 13 digs to earn her first career double-double.  
 
Between the two matches, McNee and Monge recorded the most kills, 19 and 18, respectively. Courtney Geesing, Cambria Martin, and Logan Tolbert all combined for 11 kills over the two matches. Newcomer Gabby Clark paced the offense over the day as she totaled 60 assists. Lauren Woods, SAU's libero, tallied the most digs on the day as she came away with 26.
 
SAU will return to action on Saturday, September 7 with two more matches starting at 1 p.m. against Alabama-Huntsville. The Lady Muleriders will follow that up with a match against Central Oklahoma. Both matches will have live stats available through the following link: http://www.sidearmstats.com/saumag/wvball/