Arizona Sand Volleyball: Mason and Pantovic shine in Arizona Invitational

The Arizona Sand Volleyball team shined brightly in a shutout at BearDown Beach.

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In the sports third season at the University of Arizona, the SandCats are ranked No. 9 in the DiG Collegiate Beach Volleyball Preseason Poll. Led by head coach Steve Walker and assistant coach Tayyiba Haneef-Park, the team includes four freshmen, two sophomores, three juniors, and three seniors.

The young SandCats started their season playing against each other in the Red-Blue scrimmage to get the feel for how it will be to play in front of fans. The Red and Blue teams played a four-set match and the Red team which included last season’s stars, Madison and McKenna Witt, won out.

The scrimmage is important because some of the players are transitioning from predominantly AAU and high school indoor volleyball to sand which requires different techniques and strategies. This experience helps players calm performance jitters and gets them ready for the upcoming season.

The SandCats also played one match against Colorado Mesa and won 5-0, setting them up for the first real test of their 2016 season; the Arizona Invitational tournament. The Tournament took place over the course of two days in Tucson from Friday to Saturday.

The tournament results were impressive! Four duo’s of Wildcats teams (team No. 1- team No. 4) played against and beat the Cal Bears (4-1), Loyola Marymount Lions (3-2), and the Texas Christian University Horned Frogs (5-0).

On Friday, ZonaZealots caught up with the No. 4 team, Mia Mason (Manhattan Beach, CA), and Sara Pantovic (Vancouver, BC) after their 2-0 win over their TCU counterparts (21-14, 21-18). Both young women transitioned from Indoor to Sand Volleyball at the beginning of the season.

It was a gorgeous sunny day at Beardown Beach, located across from the McKale ticket office. There were plenty of Wildcats fans in attendance as well as one Stanford basketball player and a colony of passionate TCU Horned Frogs fans who traveled to Tucson to cheer on their team. Fans sat comfortably under umbrellas in beach chairs feet from the sand courts.

Mason and Pantovic started out a bit uneasy, but they both stuck with it and didn’t back down. They turned things around quickly beating their opponents by two points, 23-21 in the first game and by three in the second, 21-18.

“I think it was just shaking off those nerves again,” said Mason, “We’re freshmen, so we’re young, we’ve never really done this,” Sara added, “We were indoor players at first, so beach is definitely a bit of a new thing for us, learning the game and figuring out how to get the mental part down.”

The two are symbiotic, they finish each others sentences and agree with what the other says. It’s quite endearing; you can tell they get along and respect each other.  The results are amazing, the season has started out well for the duo.

A couple of times during each game, the players get some advice from the coach. We were curious what he tells them exactly. Mia went first, “He’s been telling us to control our play, make less errors.” Sara continued, “Sometimes we get rattled, he gives us some technical advice. He tells us to actually focus on something and not just go through the motions.”

At one point in the first game, the referee called a ball ‘in’ that was clearly ‘out’, the ref said “The tape moved.” Coach Walker wasn’t too happy about the call and urged Mia to complain, she did her best. “You definitely want to argue the call,” Mia said, “They’ll maybe change the call, but he just didn’t seem like he was going to change his call, it was definitely out!”

Sara told us she was Canadian, and she would leave the referee disagreement vocalization to her partner Mia, we all had a good laugh.

The two feel their play and relationship is getting tighter all the time, and they are enjoying their first year at Arizona. “I enjoy just the facilities we have, they’re so nice,” Mia said, “The locker room is amazing, all the gear we get is so nice, the academic centers we have, the people who help us out with all of our homework.”

Their trainer wasn’t exactly impressed with their answer, “What about your athletic trainer?” she said. The two ladies gave her a huge hug which made up for the omission, they promptly followed her instructions after one last question.

Did they make the right decision to commit to the University of Arizona? “DEFINITELY,” said both Mia and Sara in unison.

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BearDown Ladies! BearDown Arizona!