Posted at 3:05 p.m., Monday, November 19, 2007
Houston earns WAC honor for No. 11 Rainbow Wahine
Advertiser Staff
In the space of six days, Hawai'i junior Jamie Houston was named Western Athletic Conference Player of the Year, WAC Tournament MVP and, today, WAC Volleyball Player of the Week. It was Houston's third weekly honor this year and sixth of her career.Houston lifted the Rainbow Wahine, who remained 11th in today's CSTV/AVCA Coaches Top 25, to their 10th straight WAC championship last week. She averaged 5.7 kills and 3.2 digs in wins over Boise State, Nevada and New Mexico State. The Aggies dropped a spot, to 14th, in the poll.
Houston was particularly potent against the Wolf Pack, averaging nine kills and hitting over .400, with three block solos. She had a double-double (14 kills, 18 digs) against the Broncos and Hawai'i's final two kills in the fifth game against NMSU.
The third-team All-American is seventh nationally in the latest NCAA kill statistics, at about 5.4 a game. She is hitting .249.
Sophomores Stephanie Brandt and Aneli Cubi-Otineru, who both transferred to Hawai'i this season, joined Houston on the WAC's all-tournament team.
The Rainbow Wahine (24-5) play home matches tomorrow and Wednesday night against Loyola Marymount. UH seniors Juliana Sanders, Kari Gregory, Raeceen Woolford and Caroline Blood will be honored Wednesday.
The Lions (16-11) swept first-place Santa Clara and also defeated St. Mary's in West Coast Conference matches last week. LMU junior Emily Day was named WCC Player of the Week today. Day, who has double-doubles in eight of the last 10 matches, became the 11th Lion to reach the 1,000-kill plateau last week, joining senior teammates Heather Hughes and Christianna Reneau.
Hawai'i receives the WAC's automatic berth to the NCAA Tournament. It will learn its seeding and opponent during Sunday's selection show, shown at 3 p.m. HST on ESPNU.
The Rainbow Wahine and New Mexico State have submitted bids to host subregionals next Friday and Saturday (Nov. 30 and Dec. 1). Neither expects to be successful, with UH Senior Woman Administrator Marilyn Moniz-Kaho'ohanohano characterizing Hawai'i's chances as "less than 25 percent."
Hawai'i has not hosted a subregional since 2003, when it also hosted a regional. The following year it was 28-0 and ranked No. 1 in the Coaches Poll, and was sent to Fort Collins, Colo. It has been to Austin, Texas, and Long Beach, Calif., since.
The Rainbow Wahine were 19th in the first published NCAA Women's Volleyball power rating, which included matches through Nov. 11. They are 16th overall at the RichKern.com Web site this week, and second in that site's West Region rankings behind Brigham Young.
NCAA regional rankings, not now public, are one of the tools used to select and place NCAA Tournament teams.
Regionals will be Dec. 7 and 8 at Florida, Penn State, Stanford and Wisconsin. Those winners travel to Sacramento, Calif., for the final four Dec. 13 and 15.
