RAIDER INVITATIONAL | Aug. 14-15 | Lithia Motors Pavilion
Friday's Matches
9 a.m. – Oregon Tech vs. Arizona Christian
11 a.m. – Southern Oregon vs. Simpson (Calif.)
1 p.m. – Bushnell vs. Arizona Christian
3 p.m. – Oregon Tech vs. Park Gilbert (Ariz.)
5 p.m. – Bushnell vs. Simpson
7 p.m. – Southern Oregon vs. Park
Saturday's Matches
8 a.m. – Arizona Christian vs. Simpson
10 a.m. – Bushnell vs. Park Gilbert
12 p.m. – Southern Oregon vs. Arizona Christian
2 p.m. – Oregon Tech vs. Simpson

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ASHLAND – A No. 6 NAIA volleyball preseason ranking may create the illusion of business as usual for Southern Oregon University ahead of this weekend's Raider Invitational. As is natural for a team experiencing an unprecedented amount of talent turnover, that is not the case.

Head coach Josh Rohlfing has traditionally mitigated the pain of rebuilding with a shrewd recruiting eye. Entering his 19th year, the 389-match winner does not have a losing season to his name. His all-in approach to 2024 was rewarded – with the team's first NAIA semifinal berth, a No. 3 final ranking, a pair of Cascade Conference championship trophies and a 32-4 record – but the loss of three All-Americans and every starter to graduation means the Raiders' chances in 2025 hinge on if and when their incoming talent pops.

Twelve newcomers, including eight junior transfers, merged with seven returning players this summer. Of the latter group, only two – junior setter Annie Hite and senior defensive specialist Tais Vega – were rotation staples and three were redshirts a season ago.

"Going into the offseason, probably the most difficult task was knowing we needed to fill basically every position but still remaining picky about the people we chose to bring in," Rohlfing said. "I feel like we did that, we did a nice job of filling out the roster with incredibly high-quality people and players. You look at last year's group and they were physically imposing and took up a lot of space at the net. This year's group isn't as big, but we'll be a quicker, explosive team that should carry a little more energy."

PRESEASON POLLS
The Raiders were one of three CCC teams among the top-six in Wednesday's NAIA preseason poll, joined by No. 3 Corban and No. 5 Eastern Oregon. Defending champion Indiana Wesleyan, which eliminated SOU at last year's national tournament, will enter the season as the unanimous No. 1 team. Corban, EOU and SOU also headed the CCC preseason poll; no one outside of that group has won the regular-season championship since 2013. College of Idaho was picked fourth and got the No. 18 spot in the national poll. Lewis-Clark State (Idaho), Oregon Tech and Bushnell received Top 25 votes.

FIRST UP
The six-team, 10-match Raider Invitational begins at 9 a.m. Friday, and SOU debuts at 11 a.m. against Simpson (Calif.). The Raiders will round out the weekend with two Great Southwest Athletic Conference opponents, at 7 p.m. Friday against Park Gilbert (Ariz.) and 12 p.m. Saturday against Arizona Christian. Their non-conference slate concludes Aug. 22-23 at the Hope International Summer Slam, where they'll face three nationally-ranked opponents in four matches: No. 2 Bellevue (Neb.), No. 14 Mount Vernon Nazarene (Ohio) and No. 23 The Master's (Calif.).

POSITION BY POSITION
SETTERS: The Raiders' greatest source of on-court stability is Annie Hite, who was part of their two-setter rotation each of the last two seasons and is set to become a starter as a junior. The Vancouver, Wash., product is a plus defender, has already amassed 1,288 assists and ranked sixth in the circuit with 6.0 per set last season while helping SOU to the NAIA's third-best attacking average (.272). Mia Jaeger, one of two transfers from Clarke University (Iowa), will be the other featured setter. She is another experienced hand, having averaged 4.3 assists and 2.0 digs in 2024, while Tahoma High (Wash.) standout Isabelle Foote will back up as a freshman.

"Annie and Mia are leading the way for us right now and they both have a great understanding of what we want to do with the attack," Rohlfing said. "(Foote) has incredible hands and is just learning what our expectations are offensively."

OUTSIDE HITTERS: Rohlfing had the luxury of redshirting senior Andressa Ribeiro Soares behind an all-star tandem last season, which was her first with the team. The Brazilian showed promise during her five-match limit, averaging 1.5 kills and 1.8 digs per set, and is considered a strong enough defender to play the libero position. She'll have a chance to be a six-rotation player along with Ane Tuinauvai, a 5-foot-10 junior transfer from Feather River C.C. (Calif.). Tuinauvai was plagued by injury during her sophomore season but returned to earn all-state tournament honors in helping Feather River win the CCCAA title, logging 10 kills with 22 digs in the finals. Another newcomer, Kaylie Christopher, was an All-Northwest Athletic Conference performer for Columbia Basin C.C. (Wash.) with impressive clips of 3.2 kills and 3.1 digs per set.

"Andressa and Ane are both high-level serve-receive passers, good defenders and have the ability to put the ball away," Rohlfing said, "and Kaylie is really a connector with great energy every day. We'll be as quick as we've ever been on the outside."

RIGHT-SIDE HITTERS: A converted outside hitter, Maya Watters was SOU's highest-profile get in the offseason. She came with Jaeger from Clarke, where she made the All-Heart of America Conference team and averaged more kills (3.7 per set) than any Raider on stellar .219 efficiency. Said Rohlfing: "I don't think I've coached anyone in my career who hits harder."

Friley Curtiss, a 6-1 sophomore in her third season with the team, is SOU's returner at the position. Playing behind two All-Americans, she played in just 12 matches last year but came up big when called upon, averaging 1.8 kills and 0.8 blocks per set and establishing a career-high of nine blocks. Rohlfing, noting her "game-changing" defensive ability and improved offensive skillset, believes she can be one of the CCC's most dominant right-sides.

Two more additions will get their chances: Ledua Koi, another Feather River transfer and one of the team's more consistent hitters, and Duda Leite, a 6-1 Brazilian who started for a Miami Dade C.C. (Fla.) squad that was the national runner-up two years in a row.

MIDDLES: Tessa Zimmermann, after earning a starting spot as a freshman, took a backseat last year behind two dominant seniors but stayed sharp into beach season to become an All-American. The 6-foot-1 Albany native is a career .313 attacker who has posted nearly one block per set. She'll be back in the lineup with two more big blockers, freshman Lanie Snow and junior Bella Cormack, both standing at 6-foot. Snow was formerly the state's third-leading blocker at Crater High, while Cormack put up 1.2 per set at San Joaquin Delta C.C. (Calif.). Henna Danison, a freshman from Mountain View High, is also new to the group.

"Tessa brings a high level of experience and has gotten quicker and more explosive with the attack," Rohlfing said. "We have a lot of belief in her as the incumbent but the others are capable of playing in any match for us."

DEFENSIVE SPECIALISTS: The Raiders will have a new libero for the first time in three years, tasked with replacing Kayla Neidigh. The top candidates to do it are holdovers from the 2024 team: senior Tais Vega, a serving specialist the last two seasons, and redshirt-freshmen Jadyn Daviscourt and Amanda Moffat. They have reinforcements in freshman Maelle Garon, a freshman from France, and Katie White, a junior from South Puget Sound C.C. (Wash.) who was an all-region outside hitter with a three-kill average.

"Coming in, that was a position we really needed to shore up after losing one of the top serve-receive passers in the nation," Rohlfing said. "The ones who are leading the charge are the returners. They took this offseason to prove they can do it and have really turned a corner."