Pirates Advance to Second Round of NCAA Tournament

Nov. 13, 2008

Southwestern University opened the NCAA tournament in San Antonio by handling the University of Texas at Dallas 3-0.

After breezing through the first two sets 25-17 and 25-20, the Pirates found themselves in a battle for the third and final set.  SU started out slow by going down 6-1 early which led to Coach Long calling a much needed timeout.  Following the timeout, the Pirates returned true to form and rattled off 5 consecutive points, with 3 kills coming from Audra Gentry, to pull to a 6-6 tie. 

The UTD Comets rallied back to go up again 14-9 to spawn another SU timeout.  Following this timeout, the Pirates struggled to close the gap until after being down 19-14 where they rattled off 5 consecutive points again to make it 20-19 and finally ending in a UTD timeout.

With the game of runs effectively over following the time-out, the Pirates and Comets traded points all the way to the pivotal 23-23 mark.  At this time, the Pirates could taste victory and closed out the game with back to back points.

The win moves SU to the second round of the NCAA tournament where they will take on the winner of site host Trinity Universityand Webster on Friday.  Game times are yet to be determined, but you can catch all the action live via the audio or video link on the SU Website.