The college beach campaign is halfway home. In this weekly report coach Kristen Rohr lends insight on Grand Canyon’s road to a potential postseason bonanza. Meanwhile, Nebraska has finished its beach schedule and coach Jaylen Reyes discusses his program’s place in the Huskers’ big picture. Earlier in the week we recapped last weekend’s top results.
The big gathering this week is in Fort Worth, where No. 1 TCU (16-0) is home for No. 6 Grand Canyon, No. 9 Cal, No. 15 FIU and Texas, which we featured last week.
Second-ranked USC is off until next week’s East Meets West Invitational, while No. 3 UCLA plays host to No. 8 Hawai’i on Wednesday. UCLA is also in the East Meets West.
Fifth-ranked LSU is home for a tournament that includes No. 4 Florida State, Washington, Southern Miss, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and Spring Hill. LSU and Florida square off on Sunday morning.
The Stetson Invitational includes No. 17 Stetson, No. 14 Florida Atlantic, FGCU and Coastal Carolina. Emma Grace Robertson and Jillienne Cangelosi of FAU were honored as Conference USA’s pair of the week.
Hawaii, No. 12 Long Beach State and Cal Poly headline the Big West Challenge in San Luis Obispo, California; and the West Coast Challenge in Santa Cruz, California, sees No. 7 Loyola Marymount and No. 18 Pepperdine, among others, in action.
Gathering for College of Charleston’s Creekside Beach Blast will be the host Cougars, UNC Wilmington and Erskine. UNCW’s Gabby LaPata and Sadie Sharkey were named Sun Belt pair of the week.
Lopes have “unfinished business”
Grand Canyon, which jumped a spot to No. 6 this week, seems to be a lock for a second consecutive trip to the NCAA championships, representing rarified air for a school that sits in the middle of a desert, nowhere close to an ocean beach.
The Lopes (12-4) can gain more traction this weekend, when they travel to the Fight in the Fort event that will include duals on Friday and Saturday against top-ranked TCU (16-0), California (12-3), Florida International (7-6) and upstreaming debut program Texas (0-10).
“We approach every weekend as an opportunity to get better and also to figure out what we need to keep working toward getting us into position to compete for a conference championship and a national championship,” Rohr said.
“I know we are going to play No. 1 this weekend, and Cal, and FIU, and Texas, so we have four really good competitions. But this isn’t much different…
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