WISE – The Highland Cavalier volleyball team begins a stretch of six matches in ten days with three home matches this week as Lincoln Memorial, Mars Hill, and Newberry all make appearances on the Quillen Court. LMU comes to town Wednesday evening, followed by MHU Friday and Newberry on Saturday.

The match with Newberry is one that was rescheduled due to road conditions following post-Hurricane Helene's visit through the region in late September.

GETTING WISE
- The team enters the week with an 8-7 overall record and a 2-4 record in South Atlantic Conference play after falling at Anderson in the lone match played last week.
- The team is currently 6-1 on the Quillen Court, with the lone setback being a 3-1 loss to Lees McRae in the opening weekend of the season.
- The team is somewhat evenly matched with their competition, statistics-wise. The Cavs are hitting .139 compared to .154 by their opponents. UVA Wise averages 11.82 kills, 11.16 assists, 1.61 aces, 18.08 digs, and 2.14 blocks a set.
- Kaylee Scarce's 140 kills lead the team, followed by Riley Brandon with 122 and Serina Petersen with 85.
- Piper Suddeth leads the Cavs in assists (230) and is tied for the lead in aces (16) with Abigail Curtis. Lily Gutierrez is second in assists with 116, followed by Brandon with 112.
- Curtis' 253 digs lead the team and place her fourth in the SAC in that category. Scarce has 155 digs while Suddeth has 123.
- Cassidy Farley leads both the team and the SAC in blocks with 1.26 a set (63 overall). At Anderson, she passed the 300 blocks mark for her career (she currently has 303), becoming the fourth player in UVA Wise history to surpass that mark.

ABOUT LMU
- The Railsplitters are 11-5 overall and 5-4 in SAC play under first-year head coach John Cash. Cash has been on the LMU sidelines for many years as coach of the men's volleyball team before making the move to the women's side after last season.
- LMU leads the series with UVA Wise 18-3, though the two teams might have played in the early 1970s as LMU did field some teams then, but no records are available. The first meeting between the two on record was a 2-1 win in the Mary Mars Gym at LMU on Sept. 16, 1992 (Author's note - The author of this article was a line judge for that match 32 years ago. Now I feel old…) The most recent win by the Cavs was a 3-0 sweep in the Prior Center last season.
- Kristen Moehring leads the team and the SAC in kills with 4.11 a set (251 overall). She also has 24 aces and 138 digs on the season. Abigail Kessler is second on the team with 140 kills, followed closely by Agata Bogdanska's 136.
- Lauren Pickett is one assist shy of 600 on the season and ranks second in the SAC in that category. She also leads the team with 25 aces, has 135 digs, and 23 blocks.
- Lauren Jacob leads LMU with 270 digs, while Ageta Bogdanska leads the team with 68 blocks on the season. She ranks third in the SAC in blocks per set, behind Cassie Farley and L-R's Averie Dale.
- The team is hitting an even .200 on the season and averages 12.2 kills a set. They also average 11.1 assists, 2.0 aces, 15.2 digs, and 1.8 blocks a set.
- Coach John Cash is known for his eccentric gameday wardrobe, therefore all Hawaiian shirts are banned from the David J. Prior Convocation Center on Oct. 16.

ABOUT MARS HILL
- The Lions are 5-8 overall and 3-4 in the SAC after falling at Anderson Saturday afternoon.
- This is the 13^th meeting in the series, with the Lions claiming all but one of the previous wins. The UVA Wise win came in 1998, but no score is available. The two teams first met in the Milligan Invitational Tournament on Oct. 28, 1977. The Lions prevailed in that match 2-1 (3-15, 15-13, 13-15) after the Cavs rallied to tie the third set at 13-13 but a questionable call gave the Lions the serve and they scored two quick points to claim the match. UVA Wise Hall of Famer Geri Lynn Wallace led the Cavs with 13 points in the match. (They used side-out scoring and players were rated by points scored instead of kills.)
- Coach Mike Smith is in his fourth season as head coach at Mars Hill. He took over the program days before the start of the 2020-21 season following the passing of Coach Tony Fontanelle. This is Smith's 14^th meeting with UVA Wise has coached for 17 seasons at LMU and had a 6-1 record against the Cavs during that stretch in addition to his seven meetings as MHU coach.
- Kaitlyn Grant leads the Lions with 101 kills and 39 blocks. Mackenzie Schmucker (189) and Alyssa Kornegay (186) lead the team in assists, while Iona Poenaru is the leader in aces with 16.
- Laela Jimenez leads the team and the SAC in digs with 6.09 per set (280 total). Jada Cannon is second on the team with 137.
- Mars Hill is hitting .135 on the season, compared to .145 by their opponents. They are averaging 11.54 kills, 11.07 assists, 1.61 aces, 18.83 digs, and 2.01 blocks per set for the season.

ABOUT NEWBERRY
- The Wolves are 4-6 overall and 1-4 in the SAC coming into the week. They play at Anderson Tuesday evening and at LMU Friday evening before coming to Wise on Saturday.
- They defeated Catawba and have losses to Coker, Lenoir-Rhyne and Anderson. They have played LMU once this season in an early season tournament, but that did not count for conference purposes.
- Samantha Shaffer leads the team in kills with 61, followed by Kate Brown with 48 and Madison Watson with 41.
- Annie Dill has 126 assists to lead the team, while Giovanna Ravanhani has 108.
- Dill also leads the team in aces with 12.
- Brown's 71 digs lead the team, followed closely by Katy Morrison with 79 and Dill with 67.
- The Wolves are averaging 9.8 kills, 9.0 assists, 1.6 aces, 14.3 digs, and 1.8 blocks a set.

UP NEXT
The Highland Cavaliers will have another week with three games as they travel to Lenoir-Rhyne on Oct. 21 before returning home to host Tusculum on Oct. 23 and Wingate on Oct. 25.