LAKELAND, Fla. – The Florida Southern College beach volleyball team will take part in the fifth installment of the AVCA Small College Beach Championships this weekend presented by the United States Marine Corps and the Florida Region of USA Volleyball.
2023 AVCA Small College Beach Championships
Dates – April 14-16, 2023
Times – Game 1 vs Spring Hill | April 14, 11:15 a.m. & Game 2 vs Colorado Mesa University | April 14, 2:30 p.m. & Game 3 vs Erskine College | April 15, 10:10 a.m.
Location – Hickory Point Beach, Tavares, Fla.
Championship Info – Free for spectators; Press Release:
https://www.avca.org/small-college-beach-release-2023.html
Real-time Results -
https://floridaregion.bracketpal.com/tournament/53
The Mocs enter the championship stage as a 13 seed and part of Pool D. The invited teams have been divided into four pools based on seasonal results, Florida Southern being part of the fourth and final pool featuring Colorado Mesa, Spring Hill, and Erskine. As one of two pools with four teams, FSC will play each of the other three teams in their assigned group before entering Challenge Round matches based on the results of the pool play.
As the Challenge Round matches are completed on Saturday afternoon, the winners of the rounds will advance to the Gold Bracket on Championship Sunday. Teams that lost in the Challenge Rounds will compete in the Silver Bracket and all remaining teams in the final Challenge Round matches will take part in the Bronze pool play. The Division II Champion will be the winner of the Gold bracket.
"I'm very excited to see how much the girls have grown," said first-year Moccasin head coach
Makena Wilson '20. "There are some nerves, but it will be fun to see how we improved from the start of the season to now. We've seen little victories among the team, and I look forward to seeing it put into action this weekend."
13th-Seed Florida Southern Moccasins
The Moccasins will take part in the postseason for another year to capitalize on the first season under Wilson. Mocs enter with a 7-18 overall record in the 2023 season with a tough schedule, many of whom FSC will see this weekend in the postseason championship. Highlights from this year included a great Beach Bash competition in Montgomery, when the Mocs went 3-1 overall over the four matches, with wins over Jacksonville State and Huntingdon. Florida Southern hosted five events at the Judy and Joe P. Ruthven Beach Volleyball Courts this season with wins over State College of Florida, St. Johns River Community College, and Lake Sumter Community College, the latter being on Senior Day.
Florida Southern has fine-tuned a lineup over the season to set them up for success. Of late, the #4 court pairing of
Hayley St. Martin and
Christina Ramazio has been great with an impressive record and
Sarah Crocker and
Ashli McKenny at the #3 position are red-hot. Crocker and McKenny took the Tampa #3 court to three sets in a close loss this season, with Tampa entering the postseason as the No. 1 seed for the AVCA Championship.
With an evolving roster, Florida Southern will lean on AVCA Beach Championship veterans
Olivia D'Agostino and Crocker, who have each been in the postseason two previous times. The environment is jam-packed and full of action at the beach championships, with over 20 courts in use at any given time. With the large stage, it is important for the pairings to cheer each other on and be their own advocate on the national stage. In addition to the five pairings, Florida Southern will have a sixth pairing take part in an individual tournament of pairings in conjunction with the team tournament.
The competition in Pool D with Florida Southern is fierce, with the No. 4 seed Colorado Mesa returning as the defending national champions at last year's tournament. No. 5 seed Spring Hill is the second team in the grouping with a familiar opponent in No. 12 seed Erskine as the final team alongside Florida Southern. The Mocs lost a close 3-2 match against Erskine earlier in the month on the road in Tampa. The #1 court of
Emma Shaddix and D'Agostino lost a close flight in three sets that ended as the winner for Erskine.
"We are a young team but with a lot of potential in this tournament," said Wilson. "We want to win out our pool and enter in Challenge Rounds with a great performance to set up a run in one of the top brackets. It is exciting to see the girls gain confidence and grow each day to believe in themselves. We look forward to this tournament and hope for a great finish.".
Projected Lineup
- Emma Shaddix / Olivia D'Agostino
- Destiny Ramsey / Piper Cowman
- Sarah Crocker / Ashli McKenny
- Hayley St. Martin / Christina Ramazio
- Madeline Sanders / Chloe Maxwell
Head Coach Makena Wilson '20
Wilson is in her first year as the Florida Southern College beach volleyball head coach. A 2020 graduate of Florida Southern, Wilson spent two seasons as a member of both the indoor and beach volleyball programs at Florida Southern before moving into the coaching field as a student assistant for the Mocs beach volleyball program for the 2019-20 school year. While as a player, Wilson was a member of the beach team that competed in the inaugural AVCA Small College Beach Championships in 2018, as well as the 2019 season.
Before returning to Lakeland, Wilson was the graduate assistant coach at Ottawa University in Ottawa, Kan. where she spent the past two seasons with both the indoor and beach programs. She helped the Braves indoor program to two Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference (KCAC) regular season and conference championships and two NAIA National Tournament appearances. Wilson was named the 2022 Tri-State Conference Coach of the Year in Beach and coached the pair of the year, two first-team pairs, one second-team pair, and one third-team pair.
FSC in the AVCA Beach Championships
The Mocs have participated in each of the four previous small college championship tournaments. Last season,
Curry Ward and
Hayley St. Martin earned an AVCA Top Flight award as part of the #5 court with an amazing 22-1 record during the season. As the NCAA does not sponsor a national championship for Beach Volleyball among Division II, the AVCA is the premier postseason championship for the Mocs with the program starting in 2018 under head coach Hyrum Keime. The best finish for the Mocs at the national stage is sixth, during the 2019 season when they went 3-4 overall over the tournament. Last season, Florida Southern competed in the Bronze Playoff A, with a win over Erskine and a loss to Tusculum during that final championship round.
