Texas State volleyball has officially begun its last slate of conference play in the Sun Belt. A series split with the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns puts Texas State at 1-1 after the first weekend. As the defending Sun Belt Conference Tournament champions, the target on Texas State’s back is bigger than most. Here’s how the ever-competitive conference stacks up.
The defending champions
Two teams are looking to defend a crown from last year. Texas State holds the title of conference tournament champions, while Arkansas State is the defending regular-season conference champion.
Both teams split their respective weekend series as ASU went 1-1 vs Georgia State this past weekend. Up to this point of the season, each squad’s record is likely not where they would want it to be, although the level of competition plays a large factor in each team’s respective record.
Texas State currently sits below .500 with a 6-7 record, but stiff pre-conference competition that included top 10 matches against No. 3 Stanford and No. 8 Arizona State contributed to a less-than-ideal early-season record.
Arkansas State sits at 8-5. Just as the Bobcats, ASU has two ranked losses under its belt, coming from No. 21 Missouri and No. 25 Georgia Tech.
Regardless of what happened before conference play, the level of competition that TXST and ASU have already seen should have each team feeling comfortable knowing they have already played some of the toughest teams in the country.
Early contenders
Five teams enter the second week of conference play with 10+ wins. Georgia Southern (11-2), Coastal Carolina (10-4), Appalachian State (10-3), Georgia State (10-3) and Southern Mississippi (10-3).
Of those five, Georgia Southern, Coastal and Southern Miss. each went 2-0 in their opening conference series. Between the three, only one set was dropped as GS swept Old Dominion twice, Southern Miss swept Louisiana-Monroe twice and Coastal defeated Marshall 3-0, 3-1.
App State split with James Madison and Georgia State split with Arkansas State over the weekend.
Trailing close behind
James Madison (8-6), Marshall (8-7), Louisiana (9-3), Louisiana-Monroe (9-7) and South Alabama (7-6) make up the next group in the Sun Belt. With the season still in its early stages, any one of these squads has the ability to catapult itself atop the conference.
James Madison leads the Sun Belt in kills per set (14.30), assists per set (13.30), and team hitting percentage (.271). The Dukes have already nearly matched their win total from last season, where they finished 11-16.
Louisiana, Louisiana-Monroe and Marshall are all looking to take the next step from last season as well. ULM went winless in conference play and 4-24 overall last year, making their early-season success a complete 180° from last season. Louisiana and Marshall both finished in the bottom third of the conference last year. The improvement of these teams is making the Sun Belt look like that much of a tougher conference to win
this year.
The long shots
Old Dominion (3-10) and Troy (2-8) appear to be the two odd teams out in contention for a Sun Belt title this season.
Either ODU or Troy ranks last in all seven major statistical categories to this point in the season. Old Dominion ranks last in all the major offensive categories (kills, assists, service aces and hitting percentage), while Troy ranks last in all the major defensive categories (opp. hitting percentage, digs, and blocks).
The deck is stacked against both squads this season, but conference play is all that matters anymore, meaning every team has an equal opportunity from here on out.
The Bobcats’ next match is scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 2, at Trojan Arena in Troy, Alabama, against the Troy Trojans. The match will be available to stream on ESPN+.
