SUWANEE, Ga. - For
just the second time in league history, Southwestern
University was selected as preseason favorites to win the
Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference volleyball
championship. Southwestern was also the preseason favorite to win
the league in 1998.
In a league where five different teams have received NCAA
tournament berths in the last three years, the Pirates
were tabbed as the preseason favorite to win the SCAC title
just ahead of defending league champion Trinity University. In the
annual preseason vote by the league's head coaches,
Southwestern tallied six of 12 first place votes and
received 126 points to headline the poll.
Head coach Hannah Long and her Pirates finished
2008 with a 36-5 overall record and 14-1 mark in SCAC play and lost
a heart-breaking 3-2 match to second-ranked Emory (Ga.)
in the Division III South Regional final.
Trinity University closely followed
Southwestern and checked in at No. 2 in the preaseason poll. The
Tigers garnered 122 points and five of 12 first place
votes. Tigers head coach Julie Jenkins and her squad will
look for the program's 12th straight SCAC title and 18th
consecutive appearance in the NCAA Division III
tournament.
Colorado College (108 points, one first
place vote) was the only other team to receive a first
place vote and checked into the poll in third place.
Austin College (2007 NCAA participant)
and DePauw University tallied 91 and 90
points to finish fourth and
fifth respectively. Rhodes College
rounds out the top six with 72 points.
Rounding out the 2009 predicted order of
finish: Centre College was tabbed
seventh with 54 points and Millsaps College
picked up 47 points to come in eighth. Hendrix
College followed with 41 points while
Oglethorpe University (10th, 29 points) and
Sewanee-University of the South (11th, 12 points)
complete the poll.
| 2009 SCAC Predicted Order of Finish | ||||
| 2008 Record Conf. / Overall | ||||
| No. of votes | ||||
| 1 | Southwestern University Pirates | 126 (6) | 14-1 | 36-5 |
| 2 | Trinity University Tigers | 122 (5) | 13-1 | 31-10 |
| 3 | Colorado College Tigers | 108 (1) | 12-3 | 27-12 |
| 4 | Austin College Kangaroos | 91 | 9-5 | 25-12 |
| 5 | DePauw University Tigers | 90 | 11-4 | 25-14 |
| 6 | Rhodes College Lynx | 72 | 8-7 | 18-22 |
| 7 | Centre College Colonels | 54 | 5-9 | 17-25 |
| 8 | Millsaps College Majors | 47 | 4-11 | 15-24 |
| 9 | Hendrix College Warriors | 41 | 3-11 | 14-29 |
| 10 | Oglethorpe University Stormy Petrels | 29 | 1-14 | 12-27 |
| 11 | Sewanee-University of the South Tigers | 12 | 0-14 | 3-23 |
| *Birimingham-Southern, a Division III provisional
member, was not considered in the pre-season conference rankings. Note: First-place votes (in parentheses) are worth eleven points, second-place worth ten, on down to eleventh-place votes being worth one. | ||||