CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – And then there were three. The No. 4 seed HCU beach team earned wins over No. 6 Stephen F. Austin and No. 3 McNeese on Thursday at the 2026 Southland Conference Championship at Water's Edge Park, joining No. 1 seed Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and No. 2 Southeastern as the three teams still alive in the tournament.
HCU (12-23) first took on SFA (6-22), winning the match 3-0.
Grace Melnick and
Paige Palmer got the scoring started with a 21-19, 21-16 win on Court 1 followed by a three-set (21-18, 15-21, 15-11) victory on Court 3 by
Alexa Landmark and
Lauren Vickery.
Hannah Foor and
Olivia Zeigler then wrapped up the win for the Huskies on Court 2 with a convincing 21-10, 21-8 win.
Later in the afternoon, the Huskies got revenge for a loss to the Cowgirls (23-7) earlier in the season at the SLC Mid-Season Tournament. Landmark and Vickery picked up the first point of the duel, out-lasting the Cowgirls in three sets (21-13, 19-21, 15-13. McNeese evened things up on Court 1 in three sets (18-21, 22-20, 15-9) but Foor and Zeigler quickly put HCU back in the lead, 2-1, with a 21-18, 21-12 win at the twos. The Cowgirls got their second point on Court 5 before
Sophia Sabol and
Dariya Tlevlessova won the decisive third point on Court 4 (21-17, 21-19).
The Huskies now take on No. 2 seed Southeastern at 9:00 a.m. on Friday, Apr. 24, with a spot in the championship match against the Islanders on the line.
