The Other Sports: This Week in K-State Athletics

K-State Volleyball

It was a busy week for K-State volleyball. On Friday and Saturday, K-State traveled to the Razorback Invitational in Fayetteville, Ark. As a side note, Fayetteville is a nice little college town if you're ever down that way. I stopped there occasionally on trips from Houston to Kansas City.

Anyway, K-State dominated the host Razorbacks on Friday, cruising to a 3-0 win. On Saturday, the Wildcats rolled past St. Louis, 3-1, to take the invitational title. Senior outside hitter Lilla Porubek took home the invitational MVP award.

On Sunday, K-State stopped in Springfield, Mo., to take on the Missouri State Bears. Three sets later, Suzi Fritz had the 250th win of her coaching career.

Porubek's MVP award wasn't the only hardware for the volleyball team this week. Kaitlynn Pelger is this week's Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week after notching 11 blocks against Arkansas and averaging 1.8 blocks and 3.5 digs per set last week. Last week's recap was incomplete, in that it didn't note that freshman setter Katie Brand took home Big 12 Rookie of the Week honors.

K-State still hasn't cracked the AVCA Top 25, but they're close. The Wildcats are the top team receiving votes, and will soon have matchups against ranked teams in Texas (No. 5), Iowa State (No. 25) and Oklahoma (RV).

All the invitational titles are nice, but now it's time for conference play. K-State welcomes the Italian Under-18 team to Ahearn Fieldhouse today for one more non-conference matchup. Then the Wildcats travel to Morgantown, W.Va., to take on the West Virginia Mountaineers on Friday. Match time is 5:30 p.m. CDT.

K-State Women's Golf

The Marilynn Smith/Sunflower Invitational at Colbert Hills Golf Course wraps up today. You can follow the live scoring at Golfstat.

After Monday's first two rounds, the tournament lived up to its name. K-State (+39) trails only its in-state rival, KU (+26). Senior Gianna Misenhalter fired a two-over-par 146 (75-71) and is tied for first place with a girl from KU who has a really long name. Olivia Eliasson, who led K-State at the Ptarmigan Ram Classic in Colorado, is next up for the Wildcats, at nine-over-par 153 (78-75). Personal recognition to KU's Michelle Woods (+18 162, 82-80), who was just a kid at Manhattan Country Club when I worked there. Yeah, I'm starting to feel old.

K-State Men's Golf

As touched on last week, K-State opened its season at the Columbia Regional Preview in Columbia, Mo. K-State finished in eighth place (+24) after a rough final round.

The Wildcats will wrap up their second fall tournament today in California at the St. Mary's Invitational. You can follow the live scoring at Golfstat. At press time, K-State is 18th in the 19-team field (+38), 40 shots behind first-round leader California. Daniel Wood leads the Wildcats at seven-over-par 151 (80-71) after the opening two rounds.

K-State Women's Tennis

K-State was host to its first on-campus invitational since 1997 over the weekend. The Wildcats duo of Amina St. Hill and Palma Juhasz were the doubles champions, and the Wildcats swept all six singles matches against the university formerly known as the University of Nebraska at Omaha on the final day. The previous day didn't go so well, with K-State capturing only one of six matches against Wichita State. On the opening day, K-State swept "Kansas City," which I assume is the University of Missouri's Kansas City campus location place thingy.

K-State Equestrian

The No. 5 K-State equestrian team began its fall season on the road, first in Columbia, S.C., and then Dover, Dela. The opening action matched K-State with No. 3 South Carolina on Friday. The Wildcats lost, 15-5, and if I knew anything about equestrian, I'd try to describe the action further. If any of you know anything, enlighten me in the comments. Saturday's action was more successful, with K-State downing Delaware State, Ohio State, and Miami (Ohio).

Also, a two-day road trip to South Carolina and Delaware seems like a lot of travel. Especially with horses. Damn dude.

K-State Cross Country

After taking last week off, K-State's men's and women's cross country teams returned to action in Lincoln, Neb., at the Woody Greeno Invitational. This was the Wildcats' first true invitational event this fall, with 185 individuals, 18 colleges and eight universities competing in the women's division, and 226 individuals and seven universities in the men's division. K-State's women finished second, 21 points behind champion Wichita State. Junior Laura Galvan paced the Wildcats with a second-place individual finish, completing the 6,000 meter Pioneers Park course in 21:23.97. I played golf there. It's pretty hilly.

The men's team had a tougher time, finishing sixth out of seven teams. Lukas Koch led K-State, completing 8,000 meters in 26:47.20.

K-State will now take another week off before making the short trip to Lawrence, Kan., for the Rim Rock Invitational on October 5th.