LSU beach volleyball is preparing to kick off its season with the annual Purple vs. Gold Scrimmage on Saturday, Feb. 17, and head coach Russell Brock is ready to show his new team off.
The beach squad added 14 new faces and returned 11 to the roster this year. LSU's top priority this offseason was getting those new Tigers comfortable and settled into the program.
"We have a lot of new players this year, so there's a lot of learning to do," Brock said.
In the fall, the beach team tested different partnerships to develop chemistry while also refining individual skills. Brock used this time to help the new players get adjusted to his coaching and to the team.
"The most important thing is having them integrate into our family," Brock said. "Building that trust up initially is a big thing, especially when we have a lot of new people. It's a group effort for sure."
After losing a few players because of graduation and the portal, Brock picked up seven transfers. Although the majority of transfers are coming from beach volleyball programs, he made his expectations clear upon arrival.
"We have a system that we run," Brock said. "Regardless of how experienced they are, doing things the way that we want to do them takes a little bit to unravel sometimes. Figuring out exactly where they are and then getting them to where we want them to be is kind of the first order of business."
The biggest hole the Tigers have to fill in the lineup is AVCA First Team All-American and CCSA-All Conference selection Kylie DeBerg. Aside from her skills in the sand, DeBerg also provided leadership for LSU.
Last season, DeBerg played with Ellie Shank. Shank, who has identical titles attached to her name, is still in Baton Rouge for her senior season. The duo played on Court 1 for LSU.
The Court 1 pair isn’t the only one lost from 2023—Brock’s starting pairs from last season are completely wiped off the board. His team will also feel the absence of Grace Seits, Lara Boos, Hannah Brister, Elizabeth Masters and Melia Lindner, who all saw time in the starting lineup last season.
"That's the reality of college sports," Brock said. "The good thing is that we've got half of our lineup back; the bad thing is that we don't have half of our lineup."
Of the 11 returners on Brock’s team, five were consistently in the starting lineup: Shank, Reilly Allred, Ella Larkin, Parker Bracken and Amber Haynes.
The beach also returns Brooke Blutreich, Paige Flickinger, Madison Meyers, Kate Baker, Cassidy Chambers and Aubrey O’Gorman.
His newcomers may outweigh the returners, but Brock has had a few upperclassmen step up and become vocal leaders for this team. He highlighted Shank, Allred and Blutreich as players who have become "great role models" and "lead-by-example" figures.
Losing half of your starting lineup may throw some coaches off, but Brock expects and adapts to this every year. He said he sees every season as an opportunity to polish a new version of his team, rather than just rebuilding.
This version of Brock’s beach team is full of young talent. The challenge of guiding a team with such depth yet unfamiliarity presented itself early on, but the program’s hard work is starting to pay off in the sand.
"We had a really good fall," Brock said. "I don't know that it could have been a whole lot better. Now, as we start to get closer to real competition, [we're] really starting to think about pairs."
The team also had a lineup of six tournaments in the fall. Some of the tournaments involved the entire team, while others had a select number of pairs sent to represent LSU.
"We got to see a lot of people play together in different environments," Brock said.
"Because we're looking at new partnerships across the board, it's wide open as far as what we can do," he added. "No pairs can return, so everything has to be new, and that leaves you with endless possibilities.
The Purple versus Gold Scrimmage will be used to showcase the team for the first time this year. While fans observe what’s in store for 2024, Brock and his staff will also be looking to see who rises to the occasion.
Service pressure and offensive development were the main focus during individual training, but Brock will be evaluating pair performance too. Players who execute their training while performing well with a partner will be the ones with the most potential to start.
"We've started to focus on who plays best together with all that we've learned, and then [we] put them together and see if it really translates," Brock said. "It's a fun part of the process."
The pieces of Brock’s sandy puzzle are slowly falling into place, and with real competition starting less than a week after the scrimmage, the beach team will need to decide on starting pairs soon.
Brock admits that it gets "a little stressful" trying to finalize his initial starters, but "it’s a fun part of the process" for him. Nothing is ever set in stone, though, which relieves some of the preseason stress for Brock and his staff.
"How they perform in practice isn't necessarily going to be a carbon-copy of how they perform when we play against somebody else," Brock said. "We're working with a certain set of parameters, but even as we get into season, we know that things could change."
