Dayton (3-5) has lost two top-25 teams: No. 12 Minnesota; and No. 20 Utah. It also has lost to two teams that have received top-25 votes: Western Kentucky; and South Florida.
“We scheduled tough,” coach Tim Horsmon said Wednesday. “That’s really the expectation of our program and what we built this on. Every year we’re trying to get into the NCAA Tournament, whether that’s by winning the conference championship or building a schedule that allows us to have that shot. We’ve been able to do that for a bunch of years.”
Dayton likely will have to win the Atlantic 10 Conference tournament this season to return to the NCAA tournament for the third season in a row and 19th time since 2003.
“The first few weeks, it has been disappointing,” Horsmon said. “We just have a new group of players. We lost six seniors last year, and the majority of them were on the floor.”
Other than seniors Liana Sarkissian, Karissa Kaminski and Emily Young, everyone else is new to the rotation this season, Horsmon said.
“Whether it’s transfers or players that haven’t been on the floor or freshmen, it’s been an interesting start to say the least,” he said. “We’re trying to get better. We have to get through this weekend and get to our conference (matches). I’m hoping we’re going to start to move forward.”
Dayton has played its first eight matches on the road. It will make its home debut at the Dayton Flyer Invitational this weekend at the Frericks Center. It plays the University of California, Santa Barbara (6-3) at 7 p.m. Friday, Illinois State (4-5) at 1 p.m. Saturday and Wright State (5-3) at 7 p.m. Saturday.
“It’s been a lot being on the road these past three weeks,” Kaminski said, “but it just makes moments like these a lot more special. We’re excited to see everyone in Frericks.”
Dayton goes back on the road next week for two matches at Davidson as A-10 play begins.
“I think we have a lot to prove,” Sarkissian said. “We’re a very young team, and we’re making steps in the right direction. It’s just about how we’re going to finish games.”
Dayton had six match points against South Florida in its last match but couldn’t capitalize before losing a marathon fifth set 27-25.
“We’re not good enough to finish sets yet,” Horsmon said. “We’ve not been very good at the end of sets. We call it the red zone, from the 20-point line on, and we’re just not scoring and doing the little things well enough. We have to attack practice much differently.”
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