GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— Winners of four straight matches and off to a 4-2 start, their best in program history, the Colorado Mesa University beach volleyball team will wrap up their 8-day stretch in Arizona playing three matches on Friday and Saturday at Arizona State University's Sun Devil Invitational in Tempe.
The Mavericks will begin the weekend on Friday at 3 p.m. when they face the host Sun Devils, who surged up seven spots to 11
th in the AVCA's Collegiate Beach Poll after their own 4-0 start. CMU will then play fellow NCAA Division II institution Texas A&M-Kingsville at 5 p.m. on Friday before wrapping up the weekend and the trip on Saturday against Park Gilbert, a team the Mavs just beat 5-0 on Tuesday.
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Live results for all three matches
can be found at this link.
Daily recaps will be posted on
www.cmumavericks.com. For inside content, fans are also encouraged to follow the team on their Instragam account (
@cmu_beachvb).
Last Time Out (Weekend)
The Mavericks opened their season last week, going 2-2 as a team at the Cactus Classic, hosted by the University of Arizona in Tucson.
The Mavs dropped 3-2 decisions to UTEP and Boise State last Friday (Feb. 23)
before coming back on Saturday (Feb. 24) to defeat San Francisco and Cal State Bakersfield by the same margins.
Last Time Out (Tuesday)
The Mavericks remained in Arizona and played a pair of highly-ranked NAIA squads on Tuesday in Scottsdale.
The Mavericks won both matches 5-0, taking down NAIA No. 1 and host Ottawa University of Arizona before sweeping Arizona Christian, receiving votes in the NAIA poll.
Best Start
The Mavs' 4-2 start is their best 6-dual start program history, surpassing last year's 3-3 start. The Mavs then moved their record to 6-3 through nine duals en-route to a program record setting 19-8 team record.
Record Setter
Maverick senior
Sabrina VanDeList picked up her first two wins of the season with new partner
Cedar Bellows on Tuesday. Those wins allowed VanDeList to match and then surpass the CMU all-time record for wins. VanDeList now has 49, one more than former teammate
Holly Schmidt, who finished her career in 2023 with 48 victories.
Meanwhile, fellow Maverick seniors
Hahni Johnson has also creeped up on the Maverick all-time wins list to the No. 5 position with 43, including six this year alone. Another CMU senior in
Savannah Spitzer has 39 to her credit to rank sixth in program history.
Here's a current look at the Mavs' all-time top 10 list heading into the weekend.
1.
Sabrina VanDeList – 49 (2021-24)
2.
Holly Schmidt- 48 (2019-23)
T3.
Tye Wedhorn- 46 (2021-23)
T3.
Macie Lachemann- 46 (2019-23)
5.
Hahni Johnson- 43 (2021-24)
6.
Savannah Spitzer- 39 (2020-24)
7.
Jada Hall- 37 (2022-23)
8.
Ara Norwood- 36 (2018-22)
9.
Savannah Ott- 30 (2020-24)
10.
Hailey Peters – 26 (2021-23)
Perfect Start
The Mavericks' No. 1 duo of
Hahni Johnson and
Amanda Ollinger have had a perfect start to the 2024 season, winning all six of their matches on Court 1 this season. While Johnson, a senior from Anchorage Alaska, is a veteran of the Maverick program, Ollinger is a newcomer having joined the Mavs' this spring. The Cedar Rapids, Iowa native played NCAA Division I basketball at the University of Iowa before graduating in 2020. She is now pursing a graduate degree while at CMU working remotely in the corporate world and playing for the Mavs.
Perfect No. 2
The Mavericks No. 2 pair of
Riley Daugherty and
Sierra Hunt have also been perfect when playing in the No. 2 spot of the Maverick lineup. They played at No. 3 in the Mavs' opening dual against UTEP last Friday but moved up to the No. 2 spot against Boise State, rattling off the first of five straight wins since. Hunt missed last season due to injury and also redshirted during the 2023 indoor volleyball season to fully recover. Her replacement in the Mavs' starting indoor lineup at the outside hitter position was Daugherty, who transferred to CMU from Newman University in her hometown of Wichita, Kansas.
3 & 2
All four of the Mavericks' opening weekend decisions, were decided by the tightest of 3-2 margins. The Mavs dropped the first two on Friday against UTEP and Boise State but bounced back to win by those margins last Saturday against San Francisco and Cal State Bakersfield.
The Mavs only had five 3-2 matches last season going 2-3 in those.
Tuesday's results were not nearly as close as the Mavs, won both of their duals by 5-0 margins.
Know Your Foes
Arizona State
The Sun Devils recorded their first 4-0 start in program history winning matches over three nationally-ranked teams last weekend at the Tampa Invitational. In the process, the Sun Devils moved up from No. 18 in the AVCA's Preseason Poll to 11
th, their highest ranking since 2017, when they were ranked tenth.
Their wins came over then No. 11 Florida Atlantic, No. 12 Georgia State and No. 17 South Carolina as well as over host Tampa, which beat the Mavs in the NCAA Division II title match at last year's AVCA Small College Beach Championships.
The Sun Devils combined to win 14 of their 20 total matches as Adriana Nieves Papaleo and Kendall Whitmarsh went 4-0 at the No. 5. The No. 2 (Arden Besecker/Ava Williamson) and No. 3 (Taryn Ames/Lexi Sweeney) both went 3-1. They were 2-2 at both No. 1 (Daniella Kensinger/Anya Pemberton) and No. 4 (Ava Haughy/Ava Kirunchyk) last weekend.
Texas A&M-Kingsville
The Javelinas are also off to a 4-0 start after sweeping through their own invitational last weekend. They defeated Mary Hardin-Baylor and East Texas Baptist, twice each. Two of the wins came by 5-0 margins while the other two were by 4-1 scores.
Last year's Javelina squad finished 12-18, falling to CMU in the Challenge Round of the AVCA Small College Beach Championships before finishing seventh overall as the third place winners in the silver bracket.
Park Gilbert
The Buccaneers are currently 2-8 overall and have lost three straight, including on Tuesday when they fall to the Mavs and NAIA No. 1 Ottawa (Ariz.) by 5-0 margins in Scottsdale.
They will play at Arizona Christian on Friday before facing the Mavs and Texas A&M-Kingsville on Saturday.
Series Histories
The Mavs are 0-8 all-time against Arizona State. They have met each other in each of the last three years. All eight previous meetings have been on "neutral" sand although five of the previous match-ups have been in Arizona with the last two and three of the last four coming in Tucson at Arizona. The teams have also faced off twice in Phoenix and three times in Albuquerque.
The rivalry with Texas A&M-Kingsville has been intense with the Mavs now holding a 4-3 series lead after winning the last four matchups in a neutral venue. The teams have met up at each of the last four AVCA Small College Beach Championships, splitting those four matches evenly. The teams played three times last year as the Javelinas came to Grand Junction, where CMU was able to win 4-1 and 5-0 home sand decisions. The Javelinas had won a 3-2 home decision on Feb. 25.
Tuesday's win over Park Gilbert was the Mavs' second in as many match-ups with the Bucs. CMU also won a 5-0 decision in Mesa last season (Mar. 12). Like on Tuesday, the Mavericks won every set of that dual.
Up Next
The Mavs will be off next weekend before hosting McKendree in home matches on Mar. 15 and 16.
