News Story

The Arkansas State University Lady Indians are more than two weeks into camp preparing for the 1999 season.

After posting a twenty win season in 1998, the Sun Belt Conference’s number one seed was upset by rival Western Kentucky University in the semi-finals in Little Rock. With the loss, the Lady Indian landscape shifted somewhat.

In the off season the team recruited three prospects in freshman outside hitter Amber Cagle of Paragould, freshman setter Jessica Barney of New Braunfels, Texas and freshman right side hitter Lesli Elkins of Boerne, Texas.

Cagle, both a high school All American and the 1998 Arkansas Volleyball Player of the Year, will be joining the team at the outside hitter position. Cagle lead Paragould’s Crowley’s Ridge Academy to a 74-1 record over the last two seasons.

Cagle is the third Arkansas State High School Player of the Year to play for ASU in the last five years. The other two were Lindsay White-Miller in 1995, and Junior outside hitter Susanne Snipes of Jonesboro in 1997.

Photo by Amanda Watlington

The 1999 ASU Volleyball team from front left Jessica Barney, Teddi Chowen, Susanne Snipes, Lesli Elkins, and Amy Johnson, from back left Head Coach Craig Cummings, Shauna Standart, Nikki Guerra, Beth Cochran, Katie Silliman, Michal Evers, Amber Cagle, and Assistant Coach Jason Watson.

Head Coach Craig Cummings said he sees a lot of Snipes in Cagle in that her powerful arm will be her strength throughout her career.

With less then two weeks until their season opener, a possible setback for Cagle is tendonitis. Cagle worked with trainers during Thursday’s practice on some upper arm exercises.

She also spent time on a stationery bike and did not participate in team drills.

“Jessica’s energetic personality as a court leader stands out. To have that in someone as a freshman coming in can only help us,” Cummings said.

According to the Lady Indian coaching staff, Barney will join the Lady Indians with a starting role at the setter position with the graduation of ASU all-time leading assist leader, Nicole Grimes.

As promising as the Texan is considered by her protégés, Barney suffered a complete tear of her anterior cruciate ligament in 1998. Cagle had surgury in January of this year and the freshman still wears a rather large brace over her knee area. Cummings is fully optimistic of her rehabilitation from the injury.

“She had the surgery performed in January, and six months later she was playing in a junior volleyball tournament in Texas. It’s amazing that an injury like a ligament tear would have been career ending twenty years ago, now she’s at one hundred percent, competing at full speed,” Cummings said.

With the tournament and season ending loss in November of 1998, Lady Indian seniors Nicole Grimes, Tera Hayman, and Lindsay White-Miller ended their collegiate careers.

Grimes was recruited out of Holy Cross High School in Louisville, Ky., and compiled 4,730 career assists during her four years in Jonesboro. That placed her first in ASU history and third overall in Sun Belt Conference history.

“She’s not the biggest, or the fastest, but she works hard and delivers great for our hitters. She’s not a yeller or screamer, just quietly, when she talks, people listen,” Cummings said last season.

Little Rock’s Tera Hayman, a junior college transfer, was named the Sun Belt Conference Newcomer of the Year as a junior in 1997, and followed that up with a senior season where she shared time with now senior middle hitter Beth Cochran of Manteca, Calif.

Jonesboro native Lindsay White-Miller left a hole in the outside hitter position with her graduation. A Lady Indian since 1995, her veteran leadership and knowledge of the opposition were her strong points.

Six out of the 11 members of the team will be juniors this season. They are defensive specialist Amy Johnson of Bernie, Mo., outside hitter Shauna Standart of Stockton, Calif., middle hitter Michal Evers of Canyon Lake, Calif., outside hitter Nikki Guerra of Simi Valley, Calif., and outside hitter Teddi Chowen of Long Beach, Calif., and Susanne Snipes.

The Lady Indians will open their season on Sept. 1 in Cape Girardeau, Mo. against Southeast Missouri State. They split the season series with SEMO in 1998, losing on Oct. 6 in Cape Girardeau and defeating them on Nov. 10 at the Convocation Center.

ASU will host the Pocahontas Federal Savings and Loan ASU Classic on Sept. 3 through 5 at the Convocation Center.