Beach volleyball on winning streak entering home stretch

Ethan Goodman, Staff Reporter

Beach Volleyball
Tulane Beach Volleyball will travel to play at Southern Miss on April 8 (Courtesy of Tulane Athletics)

After coming off a dominant performance of 5-0 at Tulane’s White Sands Volleyball Courts, The Green Wave Beach Volleyball team headed to Gulf Shores, Alabama to compete in the March to May Tournament hosted by University of Alabama-Birmingham. The Green Wave were accompanied by an elite group of five teams, all of which hold  an AVCA Poll Ranking: No. 13 Georgia State, No. 4 Florida State, No. 1 UCLA, No. 7 Grand Canyon University and No. 15 South Carolina.

To start the tournament, The Green Wave dropped their opening match to Georgia State 4-1. The only victory of the match came from the top pair of Maddie Speicher and Kendall Peters. Tulane was then further swept by Florida State and beaten by a strong No. 1 UCLA team. However, Sara Hall and Ashton Mares played well and got the only win against the Bruins for Tulane. 

The Green Wave ended up going 1-5 in the tournament and in total faced five top 20 opponents. Tulane returned to action at the Skyhawk Beach Invitational, hosted by the University of Tennessee-Martin, where they dominated in their usual form.  

Starting the tournament, the Green Wave swept Ottawa University-Arizona. Notable players include Sophie Gammarino who made her first appearance in the Green Wave lineup by joining other first year Emily Heintzelman. The duo got a match victory 21-12, 21-11. 

On the second day of the tournament, the Green Wave swept Missouri State. Notably pairs part of the victory, include Haley Gibson along with Savka Popovic who grabbed Tulane their first points of the day, and Samantha Mehlman along with Lara Torruella who got their match victory in three sets. 

Finishing the tournament, the Green Wave swept Liberty University. Notable pairs include Josie Cole and Sam Green who got the first point of the afternoon in a dominant 21-6, 21-10 victory, and Ashton Mares and Sara Hall who sealed the sweep.

The Green Wave look to continue this winning streak on April 8, when they travel to the University of Southern Mississippi where they will compete in the USM tournament. 

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