JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – After two days of competition, Carson-Newman starts the South Atlantic Conference schedule with the start of its longest homestand of the season with a Friday evening match at 6 p.m. against Catawba and a Saturday afternoon affair against Queens at 2 p.m.
In the history of the program, the first conference contest of the season has been hit-and-miss with an overall record of 14-15. On the road, the Eagles are 11-17 in their first road outing of the year but 16-12 in the initial home affair. The Orange and Blue have won three straight home openers and five of their last seven.
Since 2014, the school has started the conference slate with a victory in six of those seven with a 7-0 league open in 2014 standing out as the best. In the last nine years, each time the Eagles have dropped the first match of the year, they bounced back to win with the last 0-2 open to a campaign coming in 2011.
Over the last three campaigns, Carson-Newman (1-3) has used its home court advantage posting a 26-7 record with 13 sweeps. In the last 26 home outings the team has lost thrice, two coming to Anderson and a pair needing five frames.
Catawba (2-3) has been one of the most frequent opponents for the school as Friday is the 71st all-time meeting with the Indians holding a 37-33 edge. However, C-N has dominated the recent stretch with wins in seven straight matches dropping a grand total of two sets in that time. Overall, the Eagles have won 13 of the last 15 dating back to the start of the 2013 year.
Erin Edwards (Midlothian, Va.) and Megan Oldenburger combined for 30 kills in a four-set win over the Tribe last season. C-N tallied a .186 hitting percentage in the match behind 53 smashes. Freshmen registered 17 kills led by seven from McKenna Hall (Bristol, Wisc.) adding nine digs in her debut.
In 2021, the Indians are off to a 2-3 start to the season suffering back-to-back losses including a tough five-set loss to Mount Olive on Wednesday despite winning the first two games. Two of the final three sets saw Catawba hit negative with its best hitting effort of the night, a 16-kill tally, going by the wayside in the fourth.
Overall on the year, the attack has been potent with three nights of a .200 hitting clip or better with the team posting 10.58 kills per set. Four players are tallying 2.11 or better led by Kylie Morgan's 2.77. However she has two double-digit nights with hitting margins of .357 and .409 and 11 total in the other two outings.
While Queens leads the league in rejections per set at 2.71, the Indians are third in the conference with 1.89 putting up at least five in each of the first five contests. In the back row, the team is averaging 12.47 digs per set, the third fewest among SAC schools to date.
Through 19 meetings with Queens (3-1), C-N has won 10 including a 7-4 mark in matches played at Mossy Creek. The Eagles have won the last two matches including a five-set victory on March 5. However, one of the last three home losses for the program was to Queens, the only team other than Anderson to win at Holt in the last 26. It was a five-set triumph for the Royals on Oct. 4, 2019 winning 15-4 in the fifth after the Orange and Blue won the third and fourth frames.
In the spring, Tiernan's club won the first two sets before the Royals raced back into the match only to see the Eagles win 15-9 in the fifth. Megan Oldenburger led the charge with 24 kills hitting .300 adding 14 digs. Kaina Roehrkasse filled up the stat sheet in her first match of the year with six kills, six blocks and a career-high nine digs.
The Royals opened the season on their home floor sweeping three of four matches but fell in five sets to Lander. In the slugfest, Queens hit .105 or worse in four of the five games falling behind early in the fifth. No player produced more than eight kills as the team totaled 42 in the contest.
Grace Giunta played one match in the spring but was the team's leader during the opening weekend averaging 3.30 kills per set with a pair of efforts with 13 blasts and hitting clips of .333 or better. Lindsay Elmore was the most efficient capped by 12 blasts on a .529 margin against Young Harris adding 11.5 total blocks in the first weekend.
Both matches are slated to air on the Eagle Sports Network by visiting cneagles.com/live for the high definition video stream and audio commentary from inside of the friendly confines.
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