MELISSA RODRIGUEZ
@_melisssaaaa

Join the Islander Women’s Volleyball team as they celebrate their claiming of the Southland Conference Champ title for the second consecutive year.  

This season the Islander Women’s Volleyball team set out to defend their title as 2015 Southland Conference Champions. They came back this year with an impressive 16-0 undefeated conference record, which placed them once again as the conference champs.  

“We had three major goals for this season,” said Steve Greene, head coach of the Islander Women’s Volleyball team. “Our first one was to return as conference champions, our second was to win our conference tournament and our third was to get as far in the NCAA tournament as possible.”  

The Islander Women’s Volleyball team underwent some changes this season as new players were added to the roster and some new coaching staff were appointed, including Greene. Since the start of this season, everyone has been hard at work making adjustments to help this new team be successful.  

“We had some ups and downs for sure as this season went on, but we had individual players step up at many different times and people changed positions, so I think everyone’s taking themselves out of it and made it about the team and that’s what’s pushed us to be successful,” Greene said.  

The season kicked off with a great win against Prairie View A&M-University at the Baylor Invitational, which set the momentum for the rest of the season. With an overall record of 21-7, and the 16-0 conference record, the Islander Women’s Volleyball team punched their ticket to Southland Conference Championships against McNeese University set to take place on Friday Nov. 18 at 4:30 p.m.

 “We’re ranked No.1 so we have to come in with this fire,” said Morgan Carlson, senior right side hitter. “We have to come in with this ability to not break down if something goes wrong because teams are going to push at us but we just have to push back harder than we have before and I think we all have the right mindset to do so.”

The final championship game for the Southland Conference will be taking place Sunday Nov. 20, at 3:05 p.m. The Islander Women’s Volleyball team is set to compete in the third match during the first night of the tournament.

Winning Friday’s match would mean an Islander encounter with the winner of match four between Houston Baptist and Central Arkansas on Saturday. Then they would face-off against winners of matches one (SFA vs Southeastern Louisiana) and two (SHSU vs Northwestern State) to compete for first place in the tournament Sunday afternoon.  

“We love our fans, our students are amazing and our parents are amazing, we call them the ‘Der Nation, so thanks to all the fans because we can’t do it without [you],” Carlson said.