Aggies laboring on Labor Day weekend with three matches in four days
The Aggies are headed to the Yellowhammer State.
Texas A&M volleyball starts its 2024 campaign on Friday in Mobile, AL, when the Aggies get things underway in the Jaguar Invitational against South Alabama at 5:30 p.m. CT.
A&M will have its hands full to begin the season, as the Aggies play three matches in four days.
After leading the Aggies to their first postseason appearance since 2019 last year, second-year head coach Jamie Morrison wants to build off his debut season.
“I think, with every season, you get new expectations and new understandings of who you are as a volleyball team, both culturally and in terms of the way we perform,” Morrison said on Monday.
A&M is returning a number of key players to the team, including junior middle blocker Ifenna Cos-Okpalla and junior opposite Logan Lednicky, who both received preseason All-SEC honors.
Last season, the Aggies began the year scorching hot, winning 14 of their first 18 matches. However, they lost eight of their last 10 and finished the regular season at 16-13.
With an at-large berth in the NCAA Tournament, A&M fell to arch-rival and eventual national champion Texas in the first round.
With Texas entering the SEC, a Sept. 27 match at Reed Arena will be the first Lone Star Showdown between the Aggies and Longhorns as re-acquainted conference foes across all sports.
And 29 days away, the anticipation is already building.
“September 27th, make sure we pack Reed,” Morrison said. “I think it’s really, really good for volleyball if both of our programs are operating at a high level and this is the biggest rivalry in the sport. I think it elevates the level of all sports that are in this [rivalry] if all eyeballs are on that and attention is paid to it.”
Beyond Cos-Okpalla and Lednicky, A&M returns a total of nine players, and the team also added five through the transfer portal. Among those portal additions is junior outside hitter Emily Hellmuth from Pepperdine, the 2022 WCC Freshman of the Year.
According to Morrison, the amount of experience on the A&M roster will be crucial to the program’s success in 2024.
“I’ve been having conversations with them along those lines of how we are probably one of the oldest teams in the SEC now, but youth isn’t something that we fall back on as an excuse,” Morrison said. “The experience is what we lean on as something that’s going to push us into the future.”
Statistically, the Aggies were an absolute stonewall on defense. The squad led the SEC in blocks last year, and Cos-Okpalla led the league as an individual.
“We’re deep, finding different ways for different people to come in and contribute,” Morrison said. “I think it’s going to be different every single night and every single week.”
A year ago, South Alabama was 22-9 overall with a 12-4 record in Sun Belt play. Further, the Jaguars owned a 12-2 record at home. Like the Aggies, South Alabama was a first-round exit, falling to No. 5 Georgia Tech, 3-1.
It’s a quality opponent to begin the year as the Aggies begin the road.
After that, A&M will play McNeese in Mobile on Saturday at 11 a.m. CT.
Finally, the Ags return to College Station for a Labor Day tilt against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi on Monday at 4 p.m. CT.
Even though it’s Labor Day weekend, the Aggies will be doing plenty of work to begin their season.