2022 LSU Gumbo - Book - Page 40
Photos by Chloe Kalmbach & Matthew Perschall
It isn’t a secret that LSU has emerged as one of the
top dogs in college beach volleyball over the past few
seasons. Though the program was established a mere eight
years ago, it has wasted no time transforming itself into a
championship contender.
Every year from 2016 to 2018 was a step up from the
last, with the team maintaining an upward trajectory
despite a coaching change in 2017 and quickly reaching the
plateau that is the perennial top-five. From there they have
continued to accomplish new things, narrowly missing out
on advancing to the national championship in 2019 and
2021 and finishing the shortened 2020 season ranked No. 1.
That sequence of achievement carried on into the
current season, where the Tigers managed to obtain the
program record for most regular season wins in a season,
besting 27 teams and 11 that ranked in the top-20. The best
of those came against No. 4 Loyola Marymount (twice), No.
7 Grand Canyon and No. 9 Hawaii.
But there is a reason LSU is the fifth or sixth favorite to
claim the championship, the same reason a title has just
barely escaped their grasp the last two postseasons. LSU
has a tough time cracking the wall that is the college beach
volleyball hierarchy.
UCLA, USC and Florida State have maintained
powerhouse status throughout the last near-decade of play,
thorns in the sides of any team aspiring to finish in the
top-three. They have just one below top-five finish between
them since 2016, and that came in the form of USC’s No. 6
finish in the shortened 2020 season.
In their last matches against No. 2 TCU and No. 3
UCLA, the Tigers were edged out 2-3, an improvement
from their 1-4 showing in their prior meetings. Those
rematches weren’t just close in score alone either. Six of
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the thirteen sets played in the TCU match were decided by
two points and four of the five matches against UCLA were
pushed to a third set.
“I know we’re at a place where we know we can beat
those teams,” Coach Brock said.
As Coach Brock would point out, LSU has been known
to learn from its regular-season losses in recent history.
Despite losing to Florida State four times last season,
the Tigers managed to pull off a win over the Seminoles
when it mattered most, allowing them to advance to the
elimination semifinals of the NCAA tournament.
LSU has also beaten Loyola Marymount twice, a team
that recently took down both UCLA and Florida State.
“We know that we can be successful against these teams,”
Brock stated. “Our track record up until this point will have
no bearing on our ability to have confidence going into
those matches.”
Some of the other advantages the coach and players
provided were comradery, positive attitude and competitive
depth, with Coach Brock crediting this team as being the
best he’s had in terms supporting and engaging each other
and senior Kelli Greene-Agnew and freshman Parker
Bracken each mentioning the team’s positive attitude and
competitive practices.
“Our team is so deep, which basically means that literally
anybody could play in the lineup at any point,” Bracken
discussed. “I personally feel like when we get to compete
against each other in practice, it’s like playing those super
hard games that we play, so that really prepares us.”
The players seem unfazed, with any nerves coming in
the form of excitement. That attitude and drive to excel has
gotten the Tigers within reach of claiming a national title
on multiple occasions.