By Kimb Frey
Copy Editor
At 4:30 p.m., Sept. 24, just north of the Aggie Gym, Cameron University’s Programming Activities Council (PAC) held a tailgate party before the Aggie volleyball match against University of Arkansas-Fort Smith (UAFS) Lady Lions.
This was the first tailgate party PAC has thrown, according to the PAC Events Coordinator, Computer Science Senior Kavis Murry.
“One of the big points I wanted to have for this event was to support the athletics,” Murry said. “So, I wanted to run it up until the game started and then try to convince everybody to go to the game.”
In order to draw students into the free event, PAC provided soda, water and snacks to enjoy, alongside various games set out beside the gym. Students could play Jumbo Jenga, Cornhole and Ladder Ball.
Ole Kim made an appearance at the party, posing for pictures with students and trying his hand at Ladder Ball.
The PAC tailgate party ended up falling short of Murry’s hope of 60-70 attendees.
“Even though we advertise pretty well,” Murry said, “I feel like a lot of people still have our events go under the radar. So spread the word.”
At 5:30 p.m., spectators and tailgate attendees started making their way into the Aggie Gym for the main event – The Aggie v. Lady Lions volleyball match.
When the game began, the Lady Lions immediately grabbed the lead and ran with it. The Aggies fought their way to within two points of UAFS’s lead twice during the match but finished the set behind at 25-21.
During the second set, the Aggies quickly scored five points to the Lady Lions one, but couldn’t hang onto the lead and ended the set trailing by eight points.
Sports and Exercise Science Junior and setter for the Cameron Aggies Katherine Manning said they started out with a decent amount of energy and bounced back point to point with UAFS.
“Second set,” Manning said, “we kind of lost track of points a little bit, just lost track of our mindset and where we were.”
The third and final set of the match saw the two teams battling for the lead. The Aggies with a two-point advantage at the halfway mark. The Lady Lions shut them down, taking the set at 25-19 and claiming the match with all three sets.
Manning said that these matches are all about making adjustments.
“They adjusted to us and what we were running,” Manning said. “We didn’t really get the opportunity to adjust to them, and we didn’t capitalize on adjusting to them. Making small changes here and there throughout the game could have made a big difference, but it’s a live and you learn type of thing. So, you got take what you know from this game and turn to the next one.”
The next match was three days later when the Cameron Aggies and UAFS Lady Lions met up again, this time in Fort Smith, Arkansas, in the third round of matches in the Lone Star Conference. The Lady Lions won 3-0.
The conference continued with two away matches against Tarleton State and Dallas Baptist in Texas on the Oct. 4 and 5 respectively.
The Aggies will be on their home court again on Oct. 8 against the East Central Tigers at 6 p.m. in the Aggie Gym.
For more information about Aggie Volleyball, visit their website at CameronAggies.com, and for more information about PAC, visit Cameron.edu/PAC, as well as Cameron’s Campus Life calendar.