Tournament begins season

The women's volleyball team starts off their season by hosting the Blimpie/Holiday Inn Classic at Assembly Hall this weekend with their season opener 7 p.m. Friday. \nThe Hoosiers continue Saturday with almost back-to-back games starting their first game at noon and their second game of the day at 7 p.m. \nThe Hoosiers' first match of the season pairs them against the University of Maryland, which is the first meeting between the two teams. Maryland's lineup consists of four returning starters and All-ACC candidate Carey Brennan, who had a record-setting season for Maryland last year. Brennan also led the team in kills and digs.\nThe Hoosiers come back for more on Saturday starting with a match against Bowling Green State University who was defeated by the Hoosiers last season. \nThe Hoosiers beat the Falcons in four out of five games and had 59 kills in their season-opening tournament, the IU Credit Union/Indiana Invitational, last season. \nBowling Green has six seniors returning to the roster, but it doesn't seem to faze the Hoosiers who have been preparing for the opening with two-a-day practices, an intrasquad scrimmage Aug. 25 and concentration on their weaknesses according to head coach Katie Weismiller. \n"We have been working on our outside court game and have been more concentrated on getting ourselves ready," Weismiller said. \nThe last match of the tournament is against the Lady Vols from Tennessee, who boast the top setter in the SEC conference, Erica Lear. The Vols also lost one player from their previous season's roster, which did not necessitate much rebuilding.\n "We are really more concerned with our side of the court," Weismiller said about the Hoosiers preparation. "As the season goes on, normally we would watch film on the teams and strategize according to their players, but since this is the first game we are working on our own game."\n Senior Meghan Stout said the concentration has been on the Hoosier's game. \n"We have been working on our combinations and our communication," Stout said.\n"The good thing about a tournament is the girls have time on Friday to scout the teams that we will play," Weismiller said.\nThe Hoosier team is excited; Senior Laurie Gardner said that the team has a lot of confidence in themselves to make this tournament a good first step. \n"I think that we can expect to come out the winners of this tournament," she said. "It's going to be a great first tournament for us. A lot of us will be excited to get this first one out of the way." \nThe Hoosiers are also looking to break one record that has nothing to do with volleyball statistics. \n"We want more people to come out to the games this season and break all attendance records," Gardner said.