GREENEVILLE, Tenn. -- The Master's beach volleyball team got a pair of 4-1 wins Thursday on the opening day of the NAIA Beach Volleyball Championships in Greeneville, Tenn.
The Sandy Stangs, seeded No. 3 for the tournament, opened pool play with a 4-1 win over No. 7-seed Webber International (FL), and finished the day with a 4-1 win over No. 6-seed Mobile (AL).
This is the first time the Mustangs have been to the NAIA national championship tournament in program history.
"It's been a long time coming because we've had a good program for a few years, but we just keep getting a little better every year which is great," said TMU Head Coach
Annett Davis. "We had a little bit of nerves the first match because of how big this whole event is and the girls thinking about how this is our first nationals and not just thinking that this is like any other game. But once they calmed down they started playing more like themselves and the Mustangs came out."
Faith Wada, a member of the the team's No. 2 pair with
Zoe Yates, echoed the feelings of her coach.
"I think the day felt really surreal," Wada said. "You just have no idea what to expect, so I was pretty nervous. And once we played our first set I was like, 'Okay. It's me and Zoe playing and it's super fun.' It's fun to play teams we've never seen before and just have different competition. And it was pretty competitive, which I thought was super exciting."
TMU's No. 1 pair of
Annika Gudnason and
Evi Roberts won both of their matches, as did the 3s pair of
Violet Avila and
Grace Colburn, and the 4s pair of
Isabela Rodriguez and
Ashlyn Unruh. Wada and Yates got a win over Mobile while the 5s pair of
Ellie Niehus and
Ellie Unruh got a win over Webber International.
With a likely chance of thunderstorms coming through the area Friday afternoon, tournament organizers, along with all of the coaches, agreed to move the schedule up two hours to at least get the final pool play matches finished.
So the Sandy Stangs will now play No. 2-seed Corban (OR) at 8 a.m. ET, 5 a.m. PT. The Warriors (23-1) swept Webber International 5-0 and also defeated Mobile 3-2 to set up the battle for supremacy of Pool B.
The quarterfinals are scheduled to begin at 12:30 and 2:30 ET, with the hope being weather will not cause too much of a delay. All eight teams will play in the quarterfinals, with the winners advancing to Saturday morning's semifinals.
