The journey to .500 starts against No. 11 SMU.
The AVCA First Serve continues on Sunday, Aug. 23, for No. 8 Texas A&M (0-1, 0-0) as the Aggies look to bounce back from Friday’s loss to No. 7 Louisville (0-0, 0-0).
An unfortunate injury put the Aggies down their All-American outside hitter, as senior Kyndal Stowers tweaked her back during warmups.
Wanting to be safe rather than sorry, head coach Jamie Morrison decided to sit Stowers in the season's opening match.
“I told her before,” Morrison said. “I don't want you to do anything that's going to cost you anything more later on in the season and try to push something through something right now, especially if that's going to cost something later on this weekend. So she tried to give it a go, and we're pretty optimistic that she'll be able to go in the next match.”
With Stowers hopeful for the remainder of the weekend, A&M turns its sights to SMU.
The Mustangs are a familiar opponent for the Aggies, with the teams playing two exhibition matches over the spring.
After a draw in the first showing, the Maroon & White secured a sweep in the second.
Even with the Mustangs fresh on Morrison’s mind, he isn’t confident that he knows what SMU will put out on the court.
“They were banged up the second time we played them,” Morrison said. “So it's harder to really get an idea of what they're going to look like, and they actually got a little banged up within our match the first time. We have an idea of what that's going to look like, but I would say we probably have a better idea of what Louisville will look like just because a lot of those pieces were there from last year.”
The Mustangs boast a talented roster, with Big 12 freshman of the year sophomore outside hitter Suli Davis and AVCA Honorable Mention All-American junior middle blocker Favor Anyanwu being feared forces for the Aggies to take on.
To beat a team like SMU, A&M will need to clean things up from their opener against Louisville.
The Aggies' attacking percentage was extremely subpar, only hitting .152 vs. last year's .297. Graduate outside hitter Natalie Ring took an unexpected step down in her Aggie debut, only attacking at a .037 clip on 54 attempts.
With a team as young as A&M, growing pains are inevitable.
“I think it was getting used to playing with each other,” Morrison said. “And we talked about there's going to be some growing pains that happen of having a new group that's learning how to do this day in and day out. And we have to learn the lessons, and we have to learn them quickly. We have to learn them within matches.”
The Aggies will look to right the ship Sunday, Aug. 23, at 12 p.m. CT against SMU, with the game airing on ESPN2.
