MESA, Ariz. -- The Master's beach volleyball team lost their first match in the morning but came back to win the afternoon match on the first day of the NAIA Beach Volleyball National Championships.
The Sandy Stangs, seeded No. 2 among the eight teams in the tournament, lost to No. 6-seed New College of Florida 3-2 in the first match of the day.
TMU got 2-set wins from the 2s pair of
Ashlan Van Groningen/
Isabela Rodriguez (21-16, 21-12) and the 5s of
Arianna DeRaffaele/
Kayla Goodwin (21-15, 22-20). The other three pairs all went to three sets but lost.
The most dramatic match was with the 1s pair of
Emma Winter and
Zoe Yates. After losing the first set 21-16, Winter and Yates won the second 21-16 to force a third set. The team from NCF had match point at 14-13 but The Master's pair came back to tie it at 14-14. But the Mighty Banyans came back to get the final two points to get the upset win.
In the second match of the day, Master's defeated conference foe Arizona Christian 3-2.
Once again Van Groningen and Rodriguez, an All-GSAC team that entered the tournament 21-3 on the season, got a 2-set win (21-15, 21-14). They were joined by the 4s pair of
Krista Brady/
Macy Gebhards winning 21-18, 21-19 to put TMU up 2-0.
But ACU, a team the Sandy Stangs beat three times this season, including in the GSAC Championship match on April 10, took wins in both the 1s match and the 3s in two sets.
The Master's 5s pair of DeRaffaele/Goodwin came through with a 23-21, 21-18 win to clinch the match for the Sandy Stangs.
"We were consistent at the 2 and 5 spots today," said TMU Head Coach
Annett Davis. "I'm very thankful for the wins there. We need to tighten up the ship and clean up our game a little in order to get through the rounds. We are a really good team but we need to make some small tweaks."
The Mustangs will finish off pool play Friday at 10 a.m. when they face No. 3-seed Corban (OR). All eight teams will then be re-seeded to begin the single-elimination part of the tournament in the afternoon quarterfinals.
