TU Beach Volleyball Claims Conference Title, Heads to the NCAAs
So, the third time IS a charm.
For the third time in as many years, the Tulane Beach Volleyball team made an appearance in the Conference-USA championship match. In 2024, the Green Wave fell to TCU. In 2025, FAU came out on top of the Wave. Things turned out differently for head coach Eyal Zimet's troops, as the Wave swept Florida Atlantic 3-matches-to-nil to claim the C-USA trophy.
"We are elated!," Zimet shared with us. "From our perspective, we started (this quest) in August with the goal of a conference championship. Everybody's eyes were on the prize from that time. I'm just super excited that all this hard work by these young ladies paid off, and we're looking for more."
The Greenies struggled during conference play during the year, winning one of the five competitions in C-USA play. That record placed Tulane as the 5th seed in the post-season tournament.
"Throughout conference play, we were trying to figure out who we are," Zimet told us. "I feel like we played against our conference opponents (not being at) the peak of our game. But all of us felt (that) coming into the conference tournament, momentum is on our side, that we were becoming stronger than ever, and we were peaking at the right time."
Tulane now receives an automatic bid to next week's 16-team NCAA Beach Volleyball Tournament, to be held in Gulf Shores, Alabama, Friday, May 1st through Sunday, May 3rd. The NCAA tourney is a single-elimination set-up.
It is the first appearance in the NCAAs in the history of the Tulane beach volleyball program, which started playing competitively in 2012. In its first year of competition, the Green Wave claimed one victory that season, that coming over Stetson. In those days, teams were called sand volleyball instead of beach volleyball.
In case you're wondering, Tulane beach volleyball participates in Conference-USA because the American Conference does not have enough schools who play the sport to have a league unto itself.
The first to finish was Match #5 where Avery Burks and Lauren Mann finished things off in two flights, winning 22-20, then 21-19, giving the Green Wave the first of what would need to be three matches out of the five available: one point for every match won. In total, five matches were played between Tulane and FAU simultaneously.
Next to finish, Match #1, as Molly Trodd and Skylar Ensign also claimed their best out of three flights in two straight sets, winning 21-17, then 23-21.
And in Match #3, Amirah Ali and Tawny Ensign claimed two of the three flight, winning the first 21-13, falling in the second flight, 21-15, but claiming the third ,15-9.
Since that gave Tulane the three matches it needed to claim the championship, the other two matches were halted.
Now the Wave beach volleyballers await their seeding announcement by the NCAA. The selection show is scheduled for Noon, CDT Sunday and will be carried on the NCAA website. You can catch the action here. Tickets for the tournament are on sale now. You can find them here.
"I don't think the seeding matters to us," Zimet explained confidently. "We got the automatic bid. We earned it. We've excited to go to Gulf Shores (where the tournament will be held). We've been dreaming about it for years. It's an opportunity of a lifetime."
Our thanks to Wyatt Strett with Tulane Strategic Communications and Coach Eyal Zimet
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Doug has covered a gamut of sporting events in his fifty-plus years in the field. He started doing sideline reporting for Louisiana Tech football games for the student radio station. Doug was Sports Director for KNOE-AM/FM in Monroe in the mid-80s, winning numerous awards from the Louisiana Sports Writers Association for Best Sportscast and Best Play-by-Play. High school play-by-play for teams in Monroe, Natchitoches, New Orleans, and Thibodaux, LA dot his resume. He did college play-by-play for Northwestern State University in Natchitoches for nine years. Then, moving to the Crescent City, Doug did television PBP of Tulane games and even filled in for legendary Tulane broadcaster, Ken Berthelot in the only game Kenny ever missed while doing the Green Wave games. His father was an alumnus of Tulane in the 1940s, so Doug has attended Tulane football games in old Tulane Stadium, the Superdome, and Yulman. He was one of the 86,000 plus on December 1, 1973, sitting in the North End Zone to seeTulane shutout the LSU Tigers, 14-0. He was there when the Posse ruled Fogelman and in Turchin when the Wave made it to the World Series. He currently is the public address voice of the Tulane baseball team.