Jaguar Soccer Wins First-Ever Sun Belt Conference Championship
The University of South Alabama Women’s Soccer team pose after wining their first-ever Sun Belt Conference Championship by defeating Western Kentucky 1-0 on Sunday in San Marcos, Texas. | sunbeltsports.org
The University of South Alabama Women’s Soccer Team clinched their first-ever Sun Belt Conference Championship by defeating Western Kentucky at Bobcat Soccer Complex in San Marcos, Texas.
Lauren Allison, who scored her 16th goal on the year and her second of the tournament, was named the 2013 Sun Belt Most Outstanding Player.
Allison, Melissa Drish, Clarissa Hernandez, Nini Rabsatt-Smith and Shelby Owen were all named to the All-SBC Tournament team after the win.
The Jags (14-5-5, 5-2-1 SBC) advances to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history. The Jags opponent and where they will play will be announced today, November 11 at 3:30pm (CT) on NCAA.com. The tournament will begin next week.
In the 20th minute of the match, Allison scored on a breakaway by driving past multiple Lady Topper defenders to receive Morgan Motes’ pass. The Jags avenged a 1-0 loss to the Toppers late in the regular season though they were outshot 16-14 in the match and 11-5 in the second half.
WKU got their best looks came in the first half from freshman Haley Baldridge and sophomore Alanna Clancey. They both had shots blocked from the right corver of the box to preserve the win.
“This is a great feeling,” said first-year head coach Graham Winkworth, who also collected his first Division I conference title. “This was some excellent passing soccer, the best all season. And the girls defended magnificently today. We’re going to enjoy every moment of this and the rest of our season.”
South Alabama will host a selection show party at Heroe’s Sports Bar & Grill on Hillcrest near Old Shell from 3-5PM.
The 2013 Women’s Soccer College Cup will play on five seperate dates. The First round is scheduled for November 15, 16 or 17 at 32 different sites. The Second and Third rounds are scheduled for November 22, 24 at eight different sites. The Quarterfinals are scheduled for November 29, 30 or December 1 at four different locations. Then finally the Women’s College Cup will be held on December 6, 8 in Cary, North Carolina.
Jaguar Men’s Basketball Defeat Detroit 74-58
The South Alabama Men’s basketball team opened their 2013-2014 season with a win 74-58 win over Detroit to give head basketball coach Matthew Graves the first victory in his head coaching career.
Junior Mychal Ammons earned his sixth career double-double with a career best 14 rebounds to go with 13 points and two blocks while making his only three-point attempt of the game. This is the 22nd consecutive season that the Jags have won their home opener.
Senior Antoine Allen scored 11 of his team high 17 points in the first half and went 4-of-5 from 3-point range in the game. Freshman Aakim Saintil came off the bench to add 12 points and 2 assists.
The Jaguar defense held Detroit to just 28.9% shooting for the game and 25.6% in the second half. Also, the Jags held Detroit to 1-for-14 shooting from outside the three-point line.
Detroit briefly had a lead after a Juwan Howard Jr. three-pointer put them up 3-2, but the Jags regained the lead on the next possession and never surrendered it.
Midway through the first half, Saintil led a 14-3 run that gave the Jags their largest lead of the game. He added nine of the 14 points in a four-minute stretch.
The lead grew to 22 points in the second half after a 13-2 run with scores from six different Jaguars.
USA committed only 15 turnovers in the game after committing 24 against Mobile in an exhibition game on Tuesday.
Augustine Rubit just missed another double-double as he finished with nine points and 12 rebounds. However he did record his 52nd career double-digit rebounding performance to break a tie with Terry Catlidge for first place in school history. He also moves into seventh place in career rebounds in Sun Belt Conference history with 903, he is only nine shy of sixth place. He is also seven points away from sixth place in USA history.
“First and foremost, I was really proud of our team’s effort,” Graves said in the postgame press conference. “I thought they came out right from the start and played aggressive. They shared the basketball and I was so happy to see us go from taking a good shot to taking a great shot. We did a great job sharing the ball. In the first half, I think we had eight assists on 13 field goals, which is outstanding. Defensively, we did a great job rebounding the basketball, especially from our guards’ standpoint. Our guards had over half of our defensive rebounds so in our two areas of emphasis in the first half we did a great job with both.”
“I would be remiss not to mention our defensive effort,” Graves said. “This is the second game in a row that we held a team under 30 percent field goal percentage. And if we continue to do that night in and night out it’s not going to matter what we shoot. We’re going to put ourselves in a great situation.”
“I thought they responded really well and part of that was the film session that we had on Wednesday,” Graves said. “Mobile did an outstanding job of preparing us for what we were going to see tonight. Our freshmen really listened and learned and we have to continue getting our post guys to handle the ball a little bit better. It’s new for them. We want them to play out on the perimeter and when they play out on the perimeter, it allows our guards better angles to drive and kick and make those extra passes. So I think our bigs will continue to get more comfortable handling the ball. I think ultimately our guards at the end there need to understand time and score and shot selection a little more. I think that will come with those young guys.”
The Jaguars will be hit the road to take on Texas. The game will be aired on the Longhorn Network with tip-off scheduled for 7pm on Tuesday, November 12.
Jaguar Volleyball Defeats UT-Arlington 3-1
The South Alabama women’s Volleyball team picked up another key conference win with a 3-1 win over Texas-Arlington on Friday afternoon.
The Jags (12-13 overall, 7-8 SBC) has now won five of their last six matches and seven of their last ten. The Jags will end their regular season home schedule on Sunday when they host Louisiana-Monroe.
Jessica Lewis led all players with 17 kills and just missed her second double-double with nine digs. Fellow freshman Mechell Daniel got her 11th double-double of the season with 16 kills and 10 digs. Ten of her 11 double-doubles have come against Sun Belt opponents.
UT-Arlington dropped their fourth consecutive match to fall to 15-13 overall and 8-7 in Sun Belt play.
The Jags are sitting in 6th place in the conference currently at 7-8 in the conference. They sit behind a pair of teams at 8-7 in UL-Lafayette and UT-Arlington.
The Jags will round out the regular season on the road with trips to Western Kentucky and Georgia State next weekend befor the Sun Belt Championships begin on November 21 in Troy.
USA Women’s Soccer Advance To SBC Championship Match On Sunday
The South Alabama women’s soccer team celebrate an overtime shootout win in the semifinal match against Arkansas State in San Marcos Texas. They advance to the Championship Match on Sunday, November 10 at 1pm. | sunbeltsports.org
The championship match is set for the Sun Belt Conference Women’s Soccer Championship. The #2 seeded Jaguars defeated #6 seeded Arkansas State in an overtime shootout. Later, the #1 seeded Western Kentucky defeated #4 seeded host Texas State 1-0 to also advance.
Arkansas State struck first in the eighth minute when Samhia Simoa took a free kick pass from Ashley Jackson inside the 6-yard box and got it by Drish for the early 1-0 lead.
The Jags tied it up in the 21st minute when Lauren Allison collected a rebound after a shot deflected off of ASU Goalkeeper Amanda Lee and she was there to put it in the net for the tie.
Neither team would score the remainder of regulation and would go into overtime at a 1-1 gridlock. Then neither team could muster an attack in the first or second overtim periods which forced a shootout to determine who would advance.
In the shootout, both teams connected on 4-of-5 shots. South Alabama’s Jordan Duncan netted the first attempt to put the Jags up 5-4 then ASU senior Alex Furr answered by netting her own goal past USA’s Melissa Drish to tie it up again.
Jaguar Shawn Meach then scored again for the Jags as she placed her kick just out of reach of Lee to take the 6-5 lead. Then Drish stopped ASU’s Jenna Duerst’s attempt to secure the victory for the Jags.
South Alabama and Western Kentucky will face off in the Championship match on Sunday at 1pm (CT). The match will be aired on the Sun Belt Network, check your local listings for channel information.
USA’s Rush Hendricks Named To Academic All-District Team
Junior Rush Hendricks was named to the CoSIDA’s Academic All-District team. Photo by John Adams | usajaguars.com
Junior Rush Hendricks was honored for his work in the classroom this week as he was named to the first-team tight end on the Capital One Academic All-District 4 squad by the College Sports Information Directors of America.
This makes the third year in a row that at least one Jaguar has been honored by the organization. Trey Clark was a first-team selection the past two seasons and was named to the second-team Academic All-America in 2012. Alex Page was voted to the first-team last fall.
Hendricks has appeared in all eight games this season and made his first career start against Arkansas State. He caught passes against Southern Utah and Kent State and as part of the special teams unit, he has been credited with five solo tackles.
In the classroom the 6’3″ 235-pound Jay, Florida native has maintained a 4.0 GPA since enrolling in school and has twice been named to the Sun Belt Conference Commissioner’s List.
He will advance to the Capital One Academic All-America Team ballot. The honorees for the first, second and third All-America teams are expected to be announced on Thursday, December 5.
In order to be eligible for academic All-District honors an individuals must have at least sophomore status both academically and athletically, be a starter or important reserve and maintain a minimum 3.30 cumulative GPA. CoSIDA’s District 4 at the NCAA Division I level includes the states of Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.
South Alabama’s football team has their third and final bye this weekend. The student-athletes are in the midst of three days off before returning to the practice field on Sunday to resume preparation for their trip to Navy on November 16.
Non-AQ Top 10 November 4, 2013
The top two spots are tightening up with only three points separating Fresno State and Northern Illinois.
The Ragin’ Cajun’s are the lone representative from the Sun Belt in the top 10 as they have moved up to a tie for sixth place with Ohio. Former Sun Belt team North Texas have broken into the top 10 in tenth place. Three other SBC teams received votes in the poll, but not enough to break the top 10. Those schools are Texas State, Louisiana-Monroe and Western Kentucky.
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Non-AQ Top 10
|
|||
|
RK
|
TEAM
|
RECORD
|
PTS
|
|
1
|
Fresno
State (8) |
8-0
|
114
|
|
2
|
Northern
Illinois (4) |
9-0
|
111
|
|
3
|
Brigham
Young |
6-2
|
96
|
|
4
|
Ball
State |
8-1
|
88
|
|
5
|
East
Carolina |
6-2
|
54
|
|
T-6
|
Ohio
|
6-2
|
43
|
|
T-6
|
Louisiana
|
6-2
|
43
|
|
8
|
Boise
State |
6-3
|
42
|
|
9
|
Buffalo
|
6-2
|
35
|
|
10
|
North
Texas |
6-3
|
11
|
Dropped from rankings: Tulane
Others receiving votes: Toledo 6, Bowling Green 6, Tulane 4,
Rice 4, Texas State 3, Marshall 2, Louisiana-Monroe 2, Western
Kentucky 2.
USA Soccer Faces ASU In Semifinals Of The Sun Belt Championships
The #2 seeded South Alabama Women’s Soccer team returns to action today when they face #6 seed Arkansas State at 4pm in San Marcos, Texas in the semifinals of the Sun Belt Championships.
The Jags defeated Georgia State 2-0 on Wednesday to advance to the semi’s. Arkansas State defeated the #3 seeded ULL Ragin’ Cajun’s to advance.
The Jags defeated ASU in October 2-0 in Jonesboro, Arkansas.
The winner will face the winner between #1 Western Kentucky and #4 Texas State in the championship match on Sunday at 1pm. That match will be aired on the Sun Belt Network.
USA Men’s Basketball Open Season Tonight At The Mitchell Center
The South Alabama Men’s Basketball team will officially open the 2013-2014 season Friday night against Detroit at the Mitchell Center.
The Jags defeated Mobile 65-55 in an exhibition game on Tuesday. Even though the Jags started slow, they came to life in the second half to power their way to a win with a strong defensive effort as they held the Rams to only 174% shooting in the first half and 29.1% for the game.
“We’re really excited about our opportunity on Friday night to start the season of at home against a very good opponent in Detroit,” head coach Matthew Graves said. “The nice thing from the exhibition game is we have a lot of stuff we need to get better at, but at the same time, I thought from a defensive standpoint, we played pretty well.”
“We learned that offensively we have a long ways to go,” Graves noted. “We need to take care of the ball better and we need to play with a little more pace offensively, but at the same time, we’ve got guys that can turn it up. For example, Augustine (Rubit) really turned it up in the second half and I thought Mychal Ammons played well in the second half, so we have some guys that can turn it up and play at a higher level but we need to show that consistency throughout the entire game.”
“We held Mobile to a 29 percent field goal percentage and when you turn the ball over as much as we did, usually teams are getting layups and easy transition baskets, but despite our turnovers we were still able to get back and set our defense most of the night,” Graves explained. “We made it difficult for them to get open looks, so I was really pleased with that.”
“We forced things that really weren’t there,” Graves said. “We need to understand that when we come down the floor, we don’t need to attack off the first ballscreen or off the first pass. We need to let the offense work for itself a little bit, and the other thing we worked on yesterday in practice was, when we get a defensive stop and go in transition, we need to be opportunistic, but at the same time, it’s just not a free-for-all. We had several clips where we really defended for 20-25 seconds and made them take a tough shot and then ran down the floor and either turned it over or took a bad shot ourselves. All that hard work you put into the defensive end of the floor, you wasted on an (offensive) possession. We want to take away a few wasted possessions as possible.”
“They’re going to come in and they’re going to play very hard,” Graves said about their opening oppenent Detroit. “They do a great job defensively of getting out in the passing lanes. They forced 25 turnovers in their two exhibition games so that will be a great challenge for us. They do a great job of going to the offensive glass. Again, two things we emphasize: taking care of the basketball and blocking out are going to be tested right away in game one. Coach McCallum will have those guys ready and we’re excited to play them.”
“You’re looking at a program; they’ve been good for years and years,” Graves said. “They’ve got NCAA Tournament appearances and they play in a very good league. They have guys that understand the culture and have a toughness about how they play. Basketball is a little bit different in the Midwest. It’s what guys do. So we’re going to play a team, even though they’ve lost a lot of guys, those guys are going to understand how to play, be very tough and very physical. It’s going to be a great challenge for our young team on the first night.”
The opening tip against Detroit is set for 7:05pm tonight at the Mitchell Center. Come out and support your Jags!
Jags Volleyball Defeat Troy On The Road
Freshman Mechell Daniel was named Sun Belt Freshman of the Week for the third time this season. She recorded a career-high 28 kills in the win. Photo by Brad Puckett | usajaguars.com
USA freshman Mechell Daniel recorded a career-high 28 kills as the Jaguars volleyball team defeated Troy on the road 3-1.
Daniel finished with eight digs, two block assists and a .400 attack percentage to go along with her 28 kills. The Jags improve to 11-13 overall and 6-8 in Sun Belt play.
The final two matches of the regular season will be at home in Jag Gym as they host Texas-Arlington on Friday at 4pm and then round out the season against Louisiana-Monroe on Sunday at 1pm.
Jessica Lewis and Mallory Moore both recorded double-digit kills, 11 and 10 respectively. Moore also set a career-high with nine block assists. Junior middle blocker Amber Wyatt recorded 10 blocks, two solo and eight assists, for her second double-digit figure of the season.
Jaguar Soccer Advances To Semifinals Of SBC Championships
Clarissa Hernandez scored both goals in the Jaguars 2-0 win over Georgia State. They advance to play #6 seeded Arkansas State Friday at 4pm. | usajaguars.com
The Sun Belt Championships began in San Marcos, Texas on Wednesday. South Alabama kicked off the tournament with a 2-0 win over Georgia State.
South Alabama (13-5-2, 3-2-1 SBC) is the second seeded team in the tournament and earned their first postseason win since 2005. They advance to Friday’s semifinals where they will face the #6 seeded Arkansas State Red Wolves after they upset the #3 seeded UL-Lafayette 2-1.
The match took place during some harsh weather. They opened the game with a strong wind at their back and used it to their advantage as they outshot the Panthers eight to two. Panther’s goalkeeper made three stops before Hernandez netted a goal.
Hernandez then doubled the Jaguar lead just five minutes into the second period when she netted freshman Nikki Shirtcliffe’s free kick.
GSU did not go down easy as they produced 13 of the match’s final 14 shots but the Jaguar defense and senior goalkeeper Melissa Drish turned them all away as the Jags earned their eighth shutout of the year.
Hernandez moves into eighth place all-time in career points at South Alabama with her fifth and sixth goals of the season. With 53 points, she is just one shy of seventh place.
Also, Hernandez, Jess Oram and Shelby Owen all move into a tie for second place in games played at USA as each of them have 81 games each.
The Jags will face Arkansas State on Friday at 4pm. They defeated the Red Wolves 2-0 in Jonesboro, Arkansas back on October 6.
In the other side of the bracket, #4 seeded Texas State defeated #5 Troy 2-1 in overtime and will face #1 seed Western Kentucky, who defeated #8 seed Arkansas-Little Rock 2-1.