COVINGTON, La. – The Spring Hill College (SHC) Sandy Badgers beach volleyball team opened the 2018 season with a 4-1 victory over the Jacksonville State University (JSU) Gamecocks and a 3-2 win against the host University of New Orleans (UNO) Privateers on Friday at the UNO Beach Volleyball Invitational held at the Digs Volleyball Complex.
 
Spring Hill 4, Jacksonville State 1
 
1. Katie Will/Charis Ludtke (JSU) def. Caroline Herrera / Taylor Hurst (SHC) 22-20, 22-20
2. Brittany Bilotti / Sarah Senft (SHC) def. Hannah Kirk / Sadie Anderson (JSU) 21-15, 21-15
3. Julie Vujnovich / Payton Gidney (SHC) def. Sam Bogdan / Grace Jarnagin (JSU) 21-6, 21-18
4. Catherine Milwee/Emily Greim (SH) def. Bethany Randall/Maddie Cloutier (JSU) 16-21, 21-14, 15-6
5. Emmarose Neibert / Emily Sullivan (SHC) def. Hailey Hughes / Shayla Schmidt (JSU) 21-4, 21-15
 
Spring Hill 3, UNO 2
 
1 Rachel Kuhn / Cara Sander (UNO) def. Herrera / Hurst (SHC) 21-18, 22-20
2 Bilotti / Senft (SHC) def. Victoria Corcoran / Veronica Corcoran (UNO) 18-21, 21-12, 15-12
3 Vujnovich / Gidney (SHC) def. Jordan Schumacher / Kaitlyn Grice (UNO) 21-14, 21-15
4 Brianna Vega / Madison Miller (UNO) def. Milwee / Greim (SHC) 21-17, 18-21, 15-10
5 Neibert / Sullivan (SHC) defeat Ally Carr / Maxine Walsh (UNO) 21-13, 21-14
 
Following the matches, SHC head coach Shawn Taylor praised his team's effort. "I am very pleased with the overall result today," he said. "The field in beach volleyball is getting deeper every year as schools continue add the sport and more junior players are playing year-round and at an earlier age. We started off playing incredibly tight in a couple of our pairs and yielded several unforced errors. It's early in the season so that is to be expected, but we will need to clean up our play moving forward. We are also still settling in to the new season and we have a lot of people playing in new positions with different partners."
 
Taylor saw many things he liked for early in a new year. "I think some of our highlights from the day included Sullivan and Neibert picking up their first career wins early in the day versus Jacksonville State," he said. "The day was capped off by a thrilling and much needed comeback by Senft and Bilotti who overcame a deficit of 7-2 in the third set to clinch their victory as well as the win for the team."
 
The Badgers (2-0) will continue play at the UNO Invitational on Saturday beginning at 10 a.m. with a match versus the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Blazers.