The SEC website has been posting previews of the conference teams this week. Online so far are: Georgia, Mississippi, LSU, Florida, and Arkansas.

And the official UT site is continuing their countdown of player profiles. Online so far are: DeeDee Harrison, Kelsey Robinson, Kylann Scheidt, and Jasmine Brown, with another due up later today.

UPDATES: Nikki Brice and Carly Sahagian profiles are now up.

ESPN and The New York Times are reporting that Texas A&M is set to leave the Big 12 and join the Southeastern Conference pending a weekend vote of SEC presidents. If approved, the league would eventually want to even out the conference by adding another team, with Florida State and Clemson being the most often mentioned.

In their annual poll the Big 12 picked A&M to finish 4th in the conference, behind Texas, Iowa State, and Oklahoma.

UPDATE: ESPN is reporting that the SEC presidents “reaffirmed our satisfaction with the present 12 institutional alignment”.

I mentioned this in July but wanted to mention it again for those who are just starting to visit the site now that the season is about to start. The stats page has had a major overhaul since last season so be sure to check it out.

And even those who saw it in July might want to take a second look as I’ve added even more ways to view the stats just in the last few weeks. Some of those most recent updates include: view by conference, view by ranking, view televised matches, view tournament matches, view opening and closing matches, and view match and season highs for UT players and teams and opposing players and teams.

I’m also integrating the stats features into other parts of the site. For example, opponents listed on the schedule and roster pages now link to their series record or box score page.

The first match of the season is just two weeks away! You can start getting ready by checking out the promotions running during each match this year. They include: free t-shirts, prematch carnivals, clinics, costume contests, and much more. The link also includes a voucher good for 4 free admissions to to the first match.

The official Tennessee site is counting down the last 15 days until the season begins with a video profile by Coach Patrick of each of the 15 players. Up first is DeeDee Harrison.

UPDATES: Day two’s profile is Kelsey Robinson. Day three features Kylann Scheidt.

The official site has posted photos and video of the 2011 squad as they have their pictures taken for the media guide and footage shot for their intro video.

The newest Lady Vols have finally set foot on the checkerboard court this week. But it’s not too early to start looking ahead, is it? Here’s a small update on two future Lady Vols. Keep in mind this far out (from what I understand about recruiting rules — which admittedly is not much) commitments are not binding so any of this could change.

• Senior S/OH Bianca Arellano from Xavier Prep and Club Red in Phoenix AZ is on the AVCA Under Armour Girls’ High School All-America Volleyball Watch List. Last year Arellano led her team to a state title and earned All Arizona honors for herself.

• Junior MB/OH Ashley Mariani from Arlington High School and Dallas Premier Volleyball Club in Texas recently committed to Tennessee. Mariani was a First Team All District selection and her school’s co-offensive player of the year.

I took some photos of Knoxville from the river last week, including these of Thompson-Boling Arena (the home of the Lady Vols for those that don’t know the name). I especially like the second one as it shows the Arena, Neyland Stadium, and the Sunsphere all in the same shot.

We fans may have to wait another 18 days, but the Lady Vol players are getting started on the 2011 season today.

While the team have their first preseason practice the rest of us will have to make do with checking out their new official Facebook page. (As opposed to the old official page from last season!)

If that’s not enough for you, you could start planning for one of the first road trips of the season. The two away tournaments this year are just a day’s driving distance from Knoxville: Champaign IL (8 hours) and Blacksburg VA (4 hours).

Or if you’re feeling really confident on this first day of the season, you can make your plans for the last day — tickets to the national championship are on sale! The last time the Final Four was in San Antonio was a good year for Tennessee!

Only three weeks left until first serve! Season tickets for the upcoming year are on sale through the UT Ticket Office. The website lists the cost as $36, but with fees and charges it quoted a final price of $49.50. Calling in to the ticket office (1-800-332-VOLS or 865-656-1200) the final price was $42. Single game tickets go on sale Monday for $3 each for adults.

Until practice begins and the season starts, here are a few non-conference facts to help us pass the time while waiting for real news!

• The Lady Vols play 10 out of conference opponents this year — 3 in Knoxville and 7 on the road.

• The non-conference foe Tennessee has faced the most in school history is Eastern Kentucky. The Lady Vols and the Colonels have met 36 times, with UT leading the series 27-8-1.

• South Carolina is the only team that has been on the schedule as both a conference and non-conference game. Tennessee was 13-3 vs the Gamecocks before they joined the SEC in 1991, and is 18-22 since.

• Tennessee meets American for the first time in program history in 2011.

• Thanks mostly to lopsided series records vs Louisville and Virginia Tech, UT has a 42-24 record against this season’s 10 non-conference opponents. But that’s misleading as Ohio, Villanova, Illinois, Dayton, and Houston all have even or winning series records vs Tennessee.

• The Lady Vols are 94-31 vs out of conference opponents over the past 10 years. At home, they’re 38-6 and on the road they’re 56-25.

You can check out UT’s record vs 23 different conferences over the past 10 years on the stats page.

COBRA Magazine is big on Tennessee in 2011, predicting three major things in store for the Lady Vols this upcoming season.

• Among their list of the top 12 matches in the country during the first month of the season is the September 25th matchup with Florida. COBRA gives the nod to Tennessee.
• The magazine believes the Lady Vols will win the SEC.
• They also list Tennessee among eight schools that could reach the Final Four.

It’s August! Volleyball starts this month! Preseason practice begins soon! And news updates should start coming faster any day now. To get the ball rolling here a few links I saved over the summer then apparently forgot to post!

• Congratulations to Nikki Fowler on being awarded an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship.

• The Knoxville News-Sentinel’s Mike Strange has compiled his annual list of the top individual performances by University of Tennessee athletes this past year. Nikki Fowler came in at #9.

• Several members of the team visited 4-H campers earlier this summer.

The official UT site reports that the Lady Vols will appear on TV at least 4 times this season.

• Sunday, September 25 at Florida – 5pm ET on ESPNU
• Sunday, October 2 at Arkansas – 2pm ET on SportSouth
• Wednesday, October 12 at Kentucky – 8pm ET on ESPNU
• Sunday, November 20 vs LSU – 2pm ET on CSS/CST

The Kentucky match will be broadcast in high definition on ESPNU HD.

(Unless I’ve missed one or two…) Tennessee is 18-17 in televised matches over the past 10 years.

UPDATE: The SportSouth and CSS matches above may also be streamed online at ESPN3.com.

Congratulations to Tennessee on being named one of the squads that earned the American Volleyball Coaches Association Team Academic Award for the 2010-2011 season. Alabama was the only other SEC school to make the grade.

According to the AVCA: “The award, which was initiated in the 1992-93 academic year, honors collegiate and high school volleyball teams that displayed excellence in the classroom during the school year by maintaining at least a 3.30 cumulative team grade-point average on a 4.0 scale or a 4.10 cumulative team GPA on a 5.0 scale.”