AU ROUNDUP: Volleyball swept by Kentucky

Jessica Glover added her name to another Auburn (6-24, 1-18 SEC) volleyball top 10 list on Senior Night, but her efforts were not enough as Auburn dropped a 3-0 (20-25, 15-25, 18-25) match to Kentucky (26-4, 17-2 SEC) on Friday night in the Student Activities Center.

Glover, whose name is credited on three other Tiger top-10 lists, had 11 digs to move into ninth all-time at Auburn in career digs with 953. The senior from Converse, Texas, led Auburn with 13 kills.

“Kentucky is probably a top-10 team,” assistant coach Chris Campbell said. “They blocked well, and unfortunately we didn’t pass well enough to put enough pressure on their block defense. We just didn’t give ourselves the opportunity offensively to put pressure on them during the game. Kentucky is a good team.”

Sara Shanks dished out 25 assists with a team-high nine blocks while adding an ace for the Tigers in the loss. Liz Crouch led the Tiger defense with 14 digs.

Sarah Mendoza led the way for the Wildcats, notching nine kills and added seven digs. Sarah Rumely recorded 33 assists as Kentucky hit .278 on the night.

The Tigers will wrap up the 2008 campaign with a 1:30 p.m. meeting against Tennessee (20-9, 13-5 SEC) in the Student Act on Sunday.

Men’s tennis perfect at Fall Classic
The Auburn men’s tennis team opened its final fall tournament Friday at home at the Auburn Fall Classic with wins on every court.

The Tigers took all three doubles matches as well as seven singles matchups against Samford.

Auburn was forced to make some adjustments to start doubles as Tim Puetz and Lukas Marsoun were unable to compete due to injury and illness. The new lineup combined senior Alexey Tsyrenov with freshman Alexander Stamchev on court one.

The duo teamed up for the first doubles win over Samford’s Brian Dushock and Kelwin Dewet, 8-3. On court two, Milan Krnjetin and Michel Monteiro took down Michael Browder and Ryan Walsh, 8-6, for the Tigers second win.

The last win came from the team of Nick Maurillo and Alex Petropoulos over Carl Abalos and Oliver Reynolds, 8-3.

Singles competition was all Auburn as well as Tsyrenov started it off with a quick win over Dushock, 6-1, 6-1.

Krnjetin and Maurillo kept the momentum going with back-to-back wins on courts three and four. Krnjetin defeated Dewet, 6-3, 6-3, just minutes before Maurilo pulled out a 6-2, 6-3 win over Reynolds.

Petropoulos then defeated Abalos, 6-3, 6-1, and Monteiro took out Carson Kadi on courts five and six to keep the Tigers rolling.

Stamchev, playing in the No. 2 position, pulled out the win a tight, 6-2, 7-5, victory leaving Auburn only one win away from a perfect day.

Powell Porter was the last Tiger to finish playing in the No. 7 spot versus Browder. To match went back and forth as Browder took the first set 6-4, but Porter came right back with a 6-4 set of his own. The match went to a third set tie-breaker where Porter was able to sneak past Browder, 10-6, to make the Tigers a perfect 7-0 in the tournament’s first day.

While the Auburn Fall Classic pits teams against each other, the matches are scored individually with champions in each of the seven flights being named at the completion of the tournament.