Sports Notebook
Swimming strong at Indiana Invitational
At the Indiana University Open Invitational Nov. 17-19, the swim team improved times dramatically, and junior distance swimmer Brittany Massengale provisionally qualified for the NCAA championship tournament in the 1650-yard freestyle. Massengale finished third in the mile with a time of 16 minutes, 47.10 seconds, just under 6 seconds faster than the provisional qualification time of 16:53.04.
Freshman Justine Lin also earned a third place in the 200-yard backstroke at 2:03.14, trailing the leader by a mere half-second. Earning another third place finish was sophomore Carlyann Miller, who beat 52 other swimmers in the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 51.72 seconds. Miller also swam into second place in the 200-yard freestyle with a career-best pace of 1:50.73, only 0.43 seconds over the provisional NCAA qualification time of 1:50.30.
The Owls improved in nearly all events, with sophomores Diana Gu and Skylar Craig, along with freshman Megan Land earning season best times in the 50-yard freestyle. The freshmen breaststrokers Pam Zelnick, Stephanie Eberhardt and Erin Mattson all posted season-best times in the 100-yard breaststroke, with Zelnick earning 10th out of the 34 competitors.
While the Indiana Invitational was not a team-scored meet, the Owls faced fast competition from all teams at the meet, especially 12th-ranked Indiana University. The invitational served as good preparation for the Owls’ next tough competition, a swimming-only dual-meet tomorrow in College Station, Tex. against fifth-ranked Texas A&M University.
— Taylor Johnson
Volleyball finishes with loss to UH#
The volleyball team closed out its season with a three-game loss to the seventh-seeded University of Houston in the first round of the 2006 Conference USA tournament Nov. 16. The Cougars, who upset second-seeded Marshall University (20-12, 12-4 C-USA) a day after upending 10th-seeded Rice (12-19, 5-11), lost to tournament runner-up Memphis University in the semifinals.
Senior middle blocker Tessa Kuykendall was named to the C-USA all-conference second team prior to the match, and her 546 career blocks set a new Rice record. Freshman middle blocker Natalie Bogan was named to the all-freshman team after leading rice with a .262 hitting percentage.
In the 30-27, 30-28, 30-23 match, the Owls fell to a barrage of Houston rallies. Each time Rice took a lead in games one and two, the Cougar defense solidified, helping the offense to counter rallies and putting the Owls down 2-0 at the break. In game three, UH pulled to an early 11-5 lead, and by the time Rice furiously battled to an 18-18 tie, the team had no energy to put together a finishing run.
Bogan and outside hitter Jennifer McClean contributed 10 kills apiece, one shy of team leading sophomore Karyn Morgan’s 11. Sophomore outside hitter Jessica Holderness led Rice with 19 digs, and freshman Channing Grigsby had 43 assists.
— Dylan Farmer
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Arts & Entertainment
- Craig creates more complex, less suave Bond
- Fiction delivers the laughs
- Music collection triggers some serious introspection