Wingate's Rebecca Bloemer and Liz Willis earn SAC individual honors

Rock Hill, S.C.----Wingate University senior middle blocker Rebecca Bloemer (Louisville, Ky.) is the South Atlantic Conference Player of the Week, while junior setter Liz Willis (Raleigh, N.C.) earns SAC Specialist of the Week, league officials announced Monday. Bloemer earns the award for the second time in her career and the first time since her freshman season. Willis earns the award for the first time this year and fifth time in her career.

The duo helped lead Wingate to a pair of SAC road matches last week. The ‘Dogs defeated Newberry College 3-1 Friday, then swept Anderson (S.C.) University 3-0 Saturday afternoon. Saturday’s victory gave the Bulldogs their fourth consecutive undefeated SAC regular season. Wingate is 25-1 overall and 18-0 in the SAC, riding a 23-match winning streak. The Bulldogs have won 64 consecutive regular season SAC matches; they will be the number one seed in this week’s Food Lion SAC tournament, which begins Friday.

Bloemer stepped up for the Bulldogs this weekend, helping them overcome the loss of three starters. She averaged 3.71 kills per set, while hitting .455 and adding 2.29 digs per set. Bloemer notched her first career double-double in Friday’s win at Newberry, collecting 15 kills and 12 digs to go along with six assists and a pair of blocks. Bloemer had 11 kills in 14 swings at Anderson, good for a .714 hitting percentage while adding four digs and a pair of blocks. The three-time ESPN Academic All-District III selection notched her 800th career kill in Saturday’s contest.

Willis averaged 12.43 assists and 2.71 digs per set for the week. She had a season-high 50 assists to go along with 11 digs in the 3-1 win at Newberry. Willis had 37 assists and eight digs in the sweep at Anderson. She added five kills and four blocks on the week. The two-time All-SAC selection has seven double-doubles on the season. She leads the team with 6.93 assists per set, while ranking fourth with 2.59 digs per set. Her 2,849 career assists ranks fourth on Wingate’s all-time list.

The Bulldogs will open Food Lion SAC tournament play Friday at 12 p.m. against Newberry College. Every match this weekend will take place at Catawba College in Salisbury, N.C. The winner of the Wingate-Newberry match will take on the winner of the Catawba versus Carson-Newman College contest. The Bulldogs have won four consecutive Food Lion SAC tournament titles and five of the last seven. Wingate is 18-2 in the Food Lion SAC tournament since 2003.