ANDERSON, S.C. – With four of its last six conference matches on the road, the Anderson volleyball team is slated to visit Mountain Division contender, Mars Hill, Tuesday night in the Tar Heel State. First-serve against the Lions at Stanford Arena is slated for 6 p.m.
WHO: Anderson Trojans (15-4, 9-3 SAC) vs. Mars Hill Lions (14-2, 9-2 SAC)
WHERE: Stanford Arena; Mars Hill, N.C.
WHEN: Tuesday, 6 p.m.
COVERAGE
Live Stats: AUTROJANS.COM
Video: AUTROJANS.COM (Pay-Per-View)
The Trojans
Anderson (15-4, 9-3 SAC), which will play three of its next four matches on the road, has taken over second place in the Piedmont Division by winning four straight decisions and six of its last seven outings to capitalize on Lenoir-Rhyne's three-game skid.
Four of AU's last six wins have been sweeps and the Trojans are coming off a school-record .494 hitting percentage in their win two days ago over UVA Wise, and they are hitting at a .298 clip over their last four contests.
After struggling from the service line during a four-match span in September, the Trojans have posted exactly nine service aces in four straight matches – which is second only to the 10 aces they served up against Converse in the Electric city Invitational.
With just six regular-season league matches remaining on the slate, a trio of seniors have etched their names in the school record books, including:
• Lindsay McCurley is three service aces from moving onto a tie for 11th place all-time in AU's record books – and six shy of climbing into a tie for 10th place all-time.
• Noelle Knutsen has moved into 13th place in the school record books with 815 career kills and currently stands sixth in the record books with a career .312 hitting percentage. She is sixth all-time with 316 career blocks and is eight blocks shy of eclipsing former standout Shaunte' Heyward (2003‐2006) for fifth place.
• Madison Roy has moved into sixth place all-time with 2,393 career assists and is third all-time with 10.59 assists per set. The North Myrtle Beach native is fifth place all-time with a .315 attacking accuracy.
Mars Hill
The Lions (14-2, 9-2 SAC) were a preseason pick to finish sixth in the South Atlantic Conference Preseason Coaches' Poll, after posting a 21-13 overall record last season and finishing seventh in the SAC with a 9-9 mark.
Mars Hill may have finished seventh in last season's league standings, but the Lions went on to claim an at-large bid and the No. 7 seed in the 2021 NCAA Regional, which was held at the Abney Center, with MHU falling in four sets to the second-seeded Trojans.
The senior trio of Sarah Goddard, Jana Cuk and Jordan Schmucker earned preseason all-conference accolades, with middle blocker Nikkayla Stewart capturing SAC Defensive Player of the Week accolades in mid-September.
The Lions are currently in second place in the Mountain Division standings, one game behind division-leading Carson-Newman and have won two straight and four of their last five after opening the season with 10 consecutive victories. MHU's only losses have come at the hands of Wingate and Lenoir-Rhyne – both on the road. The Lions are a perfect 9-0 at home this season and own wins over both Tusculum and Carson-Newman.
The Series vs. Mars Hill
The Trojans lead the overall series, 20-11, on the strength of an 11-match win streak after dropping three consecutive decisions to the Lions during the 2015 and 2016 campaigns.
AU claimed a 3-1 regular-season win over the Lions a year ago, then held off a stubborn Mars Hill squad in the quarterfinals of the 2021 Southeast Region Tournament.
The Trojans blanked Mars Hill in their only meeting during the abbreviated Spring, 2021 campaign after sweeping the 2017, 2018 and 2019 regular-season series with the Lions.
After MHU won the first-ever meeting in 1997, the Trojans won five of the next six meetings over the following 11 seasons. After the Trojans earned three straight wins over the Lions to gain a narrow advantage in the overall series, Mars Hill swept the 2015 season's regular-season matchups to claim a brief 10-9 edge in the overall series.
Anderson defeated the Lions in AU's inaugural season in the SAC in 2010, with Mars Hill countering by claiming seven straight wins before AU won the 2013 series finale over the Lions and swept both regular-season matchups six years ago. With the three-set road win at Mars Hill in 2017, the Trojans clinched their first-ever South Atlantic Conference Regular Season Championship.
