FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 2, 2007 / Contact: Dwayne Hanberry, SCAC Associate Commissioner

Austin College takes three of four major awards in 2007 All-SCAC Volleyball voting

SHERMAN, Texas – Austin College, which has already posted a program-best 35 wins and has been ranked in AVCA Top 25 all season, was rewarded for its highly successful season with three of the league’s four major postseason awards in exclusive all-conference voting by the head coaches of the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference.

Kaitlin Listol led the 12th-ranked ‘Roos all season and was named the SCAC Player-of-the-Year. Teammate Morgan Ballard was selected as the league’s Freshman-of-the-Year and Austin College head coach Ed Garza was tabbed as the SCAC Coach-of-the-Year.

In that same voting, Samantha Lingamfelter of Southwestern University was selected as the SCAC Backrow Player-of-the-Year.

Kaitlin Listol, a senior right side from Richardson, Texas, hit a league-high .414 during the regular season and also led the SCAC in both kills (629) and kills per game (5.03). She is just 13 kills from establishing a new conference single-season high and is in line to become just the eighth player in SCAC history to have a .400+ hitting percentage for a complete season. Her kills total and hitting percentage are both single-season Austin College records and she broke the school’s career kills mark earlier this season. A two-time SCAC Player-of-the-Week selection, Listol is also averaging 0.51 aces (fifth in the SCAC) and 1.10 blocks per game (fifth in the SCAC) and was named the MVP at three different tournaments this season.

Listol received seven first-place votes from the coaches to earn Player-of-the-Year honors, while Sara Buros of Trinity University – last season’s SCAC Player-of-the-Year – received two. Kim Hamer of DePauw University and Katherine Delavan of Rhodes College received one vote each.

Morgan Ballard, a first-year middle blocker from Sherman, Texas, finished the regular season with 285 kills in 501 total attacks for a .465 hitting percentage. She averaged 3.24 kills and 1.42 blocks per game and was named both the SCAC Player-of-the-Week and the AVCA Division III National Player-of-the-Week on Oct. 15.

Ballard received five votes in earning FOTY honors, nudging out Emily Perkins of Colorado College, who received four votes. Heather Keenan of Millsaps College and Stephanie Parazak of Rhodes each received one vote.

Samantha Lingamfelter, a sophomore libero from New Braunfels, Texas, led the SCAC in digs during the regular season, posting 656 to go along with the 685 she had last season when she finished runner-up in the Backrow Player-of-the-Year voting. Lingamfelter is averaging 5.17 digs a game this season as well as 0.30 service aces.