LAKE CHARLES—For the second week in a row the McNeese volleyball team will take part in a tournament, this time it's the Ole Miss Rebel Invitational, which is slated for Friday and Saturday.
 
McNeese (1-3) is coming off an opening weekend that saw the Cowgirls improve each match that saw head coach Ashleigh Fitzgerald and her staff playing four freshman at one time throughout the weekend. The Cowgirls opened the season with a four set loss to Southern Miss before taking Tulane to a five set match. Despite dropping that match also to fall 0-2 on the season, McNeese bounced back with a straight set win over Grambling to end play at the Southern Miss Invitational. McNeese closed out the weekend with another five-set loss at Mississippi State. In this set, the Cowgirls showed some resilience after starting with match 0-2 in the first two sets. McNeese regrouped and tied the match two sets apiece after winning the third and fourth set. The fifth set was a nail biter until the end and the Cowgirls had their chance to pick up the win but Miss. State went on to take the final set.
 
This weekend, the Cowgirls will take on North Carolina State (2-2) at 3 p.m. Friday afternoon. The Wolfpack defeated Northwestern State and Boise State and dropped its matches to TCU and Arkansas State last weekend at the TCU Tournament.
 
McNeese will face Ole Miss (3-0) at 1 p.m. and UT-Arlington (2-2) at 5 p.m. Saturday to conclude tournament play. Ole Miss picked up wins over UC Davis, North Dakota and Nebraska-Omaha at the North Dakota Tournament. UT-Arlington picked up wins over Sam Houston State and Arkansas-Pine Bluff and its loss came against Sacramento State and North Texas at the UT-Arlington Maverick Classic.
 
Freshman Keegan Nelms leads the team with 41 kills, six service aces while senior Rebecca Korenek has 29 kills and a .250 hitting percent. Senior Hailee Showers is hitting .238 with 24 kills. Freshman Hailey Schneider, who was named to the Southern Miss Invitational all-tournament team, leads with 13 blocks and also has 24 kills to her credit. Senior libero Bridget Justis leads the back line with 73 digs (4.29 aps) while junior Adison Giambrone and freshman Angela McGownd have 30 apiece.
 
Live stats will be provided for all matches. The match against Ole Miss will be the only match streamed and can be seen on SECN+. All links can be found by going to the volleyball page on mcneesesports.com.