Beach Volleyball Championships

[SubGod22]

KAKE - 'Yeah, I'm from Kansas': Former Wichita area volleyball standouts Shank and Larkin competing at nationals

The NCAA Beach Volleyball Championship is underway in Gulf Shores, Alabama and two former Wichita area volleyball standouts are going for gold.

Ellie Shank and Ella Larkin, both LSU Tigers, helped the team take down FAU today to advance to the quarterfinals.

A Valley Center graduate, Shank is a junior on the squad while former Bishop Carroll standout Ella Larkin is a sophomore.

In the first round today, Shank and Kylie DeBerg brought the effort on Court 1, winning 21-17 and 21-12.

With the duel tied at 2-2, Larkin and Lara Boos clinched the match for the Tigers on Court Four. No. 5-seeded LSU beat No. 12-seeded FAU 3-2 to survive and advance.

"It was super exciting, especially getting to watch Ella's court clinch the duel for us. FAU was a really good team that we knew was going to put up a fight, and last year they went on a run at nationals. So they're pretty good in the postseason so it was exciting to advance to tomorrow," Shank said.

Lara Boos and Ella Larkin were also awarded AVCA Top Flight for their ongoing performance on Court 4 today.

This is the first Top Flight honor that Boos and Larkin have earned. In order to be earn Top Flight recognition a pair must play together in 15 matches or more on the same court and also win at least 75-percent of those matches.

Meanwhile, DeBerg and Shank earned the honor of AVCA First Team All-American yesterday.

The pair have been dominant this year with an overall record of 22-11 with wins over Top 20 opponents including; South Carolina, FSU, Washington UCLA, FAU, and GCU.

LSU went on to lose to Florida State on Saturday, who then lost to UCLA, who then lost to USC who are the national champions for the third straight year.

Bracket

Would love to see WSU get in on this. I wouldn't think it's overly expensive and with the AAC being such a southern based conference one would think the conference could do okay if they added it.

It seems like Lambo once talked about the idea of adding it, but that was years ago and it may not have actually been him.

[SubGod22]

Looks like the AAC will have four schools that participate in it based on the list I found.

FAU, Tulane, UAB, and USF.

Also noticed that SWOMO is on the list.

[1972Shocker]

[url=https://www.kake.com/story/48862529/yeah-im-from-kansas-former-wichita-area-volleyball-standouts-shank-and-larkin-competing-at-nationals]
It seems like Lambo once talked about the idea of adding it, but that was years ago and it may not have actually been him.

I heard him talk about at one of the Match Club pre-game meetings with Lambo and he was very interested in it at that time. However, you are right in that was many years ago. At this point I think he would probably just like to have his recruiting budget restored.

However, as I have posted numerous times, I would give serious consideration to dropping women's golf, with all due respect to the women's perfect APR score released recently, and adding beach volleyball. That assumes we can't afford both. The arguments against Beach Volleyball is our crappy late winter/early spring weather and the availability of teams to compete within a reasonable geographic footprint. Now matches can be moved indoors if weather or the condition of the courts threatens the health and/or safety of the athletes, provided that a regulation sand volleyball court(s) is available indoors. Outdoor matches require 2 courts and 3 is recommended. Matches moved indoors can be played on 1 court, if there is only 1 court available.

Also, how does having sand volleyball impact your spring volleyball training and scrimmages?

Here is Missouri State's schedule for the 2023 season: https://missouristatebears.com/sport...yball/schedule

Now if we are just going to add another sport that fills out the menu the best that would probably be soccer since it is played in the fall and the only other sports WSU sponsor's during the fall is XC, not really a spectator sport. Although there is some fall baseball and softball.

[SubGod22]

I heard him talk about at one of the Match Club pre-game meetings with Lambo and he was very interested in it at that time. However, you are right in that was many years ago. At this point I think he would probably just like to have his recruiting budget restored.

However, as I have posted numerous times, I would give serious consideration to dropping women's golf, with all due respect to the women's perfect APR score released recently, and adding beach volleyball. That assumes we can't afford both. The arguments against Beach Volleyball is our crappy late winter/early spring weather and the availability of teams to compete within a reasonable geographic footprint. Now matches can be moved indoors if weather or the condition of the courts threatens the health and/or safety of the athletes, provided that a regulation sand volleyball court(s) is available indoors. Outdoor matches require 2 courts and 3 is recommended. Matches moved indoors can be played on 1 court, if there is only 1 court available.

Also, how does having sand volleyball impact your spring volleyball training and scrimmages?

Here is Missouri State's schedule for the 2023 season: https://missouristatebears.com/sport...yball/schedule

Now if we are just going to add another sport that fills out the menu the best that would probably be soccer since it is played in the fall and the only other sports WSU sponsor's during the fall is XC, not really a spectator sport. Although there is some fall baseball and softball.

Fall has volleyball as well.

I do agree though that the most likely, and the one that makes the most sense to add, is soccer. I really hope this becomes a reality as Cessna gets remade and closer to finished.

Beach VB would have to schedule much like baseball and softball do and travel early to the west coast or down south due to the weather.

I'm not sure where we'd put a beach VB facility on campus, but I'm sure it could be figured out. I'm not sure about regulation size or anything, but the new facility in Derby has indoor/outdoor options for sand courts and I think there's a facility on the east side of town that might have some. If there were a weather issue, there are indoor options (possibly) near by.

Schools I can find that seem to be a reasonable bus ride away are Houston Baptist, SWOMO, Stephen F Austin, TCU, Central Arkansas, and Nebraska.

A little further, but maybe doable would be LSU, Nicholls State, aTm-CC, Tennessee-Martin, UTEP, Tulane, Louisiana-Monroe, and New Orleans.

The bulk of the teams are in the SW and extreme SE (Florida).

[SubGod22]

They're back in the news.

Eagle - How a Wichita duo helped LSU beach volleyball pull of biggest NCAA upset in history

Growing up in land-locked Kansas didn’t prevent a pair of Wichita natives from helping the LSU beach volleyball team pull off the largest upset in NCAA Beach tournament history.

Valley Center graduate Ellie Shank and Bishop Carroll graduate Ella Larkin each played a role in helping guide the 11th-seeded Tigers to a Cinderella run to the Final Four, which included two straight upset victories.

The win over No. 3 seed Stanford, 3-2, broadcast nationally on ESPN2 this past Saturday clinched the deepest postseason run by a No. 11 seed in NCAA Beach history. The Tigers eventually lost to No. 2 seed UCLA, 3-1, in the national semifinals.
.....
Larkin and her partner, Aubrey O’Gorman, played a key role in both upset victories at the NCAA tournament. They finished the season with a 12-3 record together on Court 3.

The duo rallied to win a three-set match on Court 3 to clinch the team’s victory over No. 6 seed TCU in Friday’s opening-round match, then won another three-set match on Court 3 to help take down Stanford in a historic upset.
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Meanwhile, Shank and her partner, Gabi Bailey, served as the top doubles team on Court 1 throughout the postseason run. Shank (25-6) finished with a team-high 25 victories on the season with a 13-5 record on Court 1.

Shank’s past accomplishments also include a Fall AVCA Pairs National Championship in November 2022 with her former partner, Kyle Deberg. She also was recently named an AVCA second team All-American.

Larkin and Shank were formerly standout indoor volleyball players growing up in Wichita, but found their niche in beach volleyball together. They both trained under Larkin’s father, Scott, at the Wichita Sports Forum, where he formed the city’s first beach volleyball club: No Coast Beach Volleyball.

It can't be that expensive to start it up right? And I'm sure some of these girls can make plenty on their own through NIL.

[JVShocker]

I'm like 12 years old. You had me at beach volleyball, and lost me when there were no pictures to go with all the words. Lol. I played at least one match against Scott Larkin. Super talented player and beyond athletic.