2008 Woodie Awards
Volleyball hosts No. 5 Florida
Derek Oxford
Issue date: 10/12/07 Section: Sports
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These two contests round up the four-game home stand Arkansas is enjoying at Barnhill Arena.
Friday night's game versus Florida will be televised by Sun Sports and will be Arkansas' first and possibly only televised match of the year.
The Lady'Backs (8-10, 2-6) have struggled so far this year in Southeastern Conference play. They rank at the bottom of most SEC statistics, ranking seventh in hitting percentage (.212), eighth in assists (13.25), seventh in kills (14.57), and 11th in digs (13.94).
Although they have had conference struggles, they did manage to defeat Georgia last Friday night. They then proceeded to drop a close decision to the Auburn Tigers Sunday afternoon.
With the Florida Gators coming to town, there is no margin for error. Recent history does not bode well for the Lady'Backs, however, as they have failed to defeat the Gators in 23 of their 24 all-time match-ups.
Senior Marcie Hampton hit .545 last weekend for the Gators in victories over Kentucky and Tennessee. She earned SEC Offensive Player of the Week for her efforts.
Florida (15-0, 8-0) has yet to lose this season and is one of only six remaining undefeated teams in the country. Arkansas will have to display its best effort of the season Friday if they want to have a chance versus the Gators.
"Every match this season has been a challenge," Poole said. "Certainly Florida is the best team we've seen all season. They think of themselves as a Final Four team, and they are playing like it."
Arkansas was dealt some bad news when they learned junior Christina Lawrence would be unavailable this weekend. She went down with a knee injury in the win over Georgia. The starting hitter will not play this weekend.
Meanwhile, South Carolina (9-8, 2-6) mirrors Arkansas' conference record and should be a game that the Lady'Backs can handle if they play up to their potential. The Lady'Backs have defeated the Gamecocks in five of their last six meetings, including three in a row.
The Lady'Backs have shown flashes of brilliance this season, but have lost several games because they were unable to finish the other team off.
"We knew this would be a transition year for us," Poole said, "but we've had some little things come up that have thrown us even further off of our game plan. That said, I think this team has shown a lot of character and continues to play hard and gets better each time we take the court. We are really working on becoming more consistent and limiting our unforced errors."
Freshman Sarah Freudenrich looks to continue her stellar play this weekend after coming off a career-best 12 kills last Friday in the win against Georgia. She also tied her season (and career-best) by hitting .500 in a loss to Auburn.
Freudenrich ranks second in the SEC with a 1.55 blocks per game average.
Senior Jessica Dorrell is ranked eighth in kills per game going into this weekend's matches. She averages 3.61 kills in SEC-only contests.
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