Pepperdine Men's Volleyball Lands Two First Team All-Americans
5/6/2004 12:00:00 AM | Men's Volleyball
May 6, 2004
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- The American Volleyball Coaches Association today announced two Pepperdine men's volleyball players were named to the All-America teams. Junior Sean Rooney and senior Fred Winters earned first-team honors. The announcement marked the third straight time Rooney picked up the accolode and the second time for Winters, respectively.
Rooney, a 6-9 junior outside hitter for Pepperdine University, earned his third AVCA All-American award in as many years after leading the Waves to the MPSF semifinals. He ranked sixth nationally in points per game with a 5.41 average. Rooney hit .364 for the season with 25 straight double-digit kills matches to end the season. He added 1.49 digs and 0.67 blocks per game.
Winters, a 6-5 senior outside hitter for Pepperdine University, ranked third this season in points per game with a 5.68 average en route to earning a second AVCA All-America award. He averaged 4.92 kills as he reached double-digit kills in all 26 matches he played. Winters, who finished his career with 1,525 kills, contributed a .402 hitting percentage in 2004 to go with 1.38 digs per game on defense.
Long Beach State placed three 49ers on the 2004 AVCA All-America First-Team, including setter Tyler Hildebrand, outside hitter Scott Touzinsky and middle blocker David Lee. Brigham Young placed a total of four athletes on the two teams. BYU junior setter Carlos Moreno is a two-time AVCA All-American and is joined on the first-team by fellow Cougar Fernando Pessoa. BYU also placed Victor Batista and Joe Hillman on the second team.
This year's AVCA All-America Teams have six players returning to the squads for at least their second season. Pepperdine outside hitters Rooney and Winters, both repeat selections, were selected to this year's first team. Rooney is three-time selection to the AVCA All-America Teams and was named to the first team for the second consecutive year. Winters moved up this year from second team to first team. Penn State middle blocker Keith Kowal and libero Ricky Mattei are two-time honorees. Kowal was named to the first-team this year after being on the second team in 2003 and Mattei was selected to the second-team after being a member of the second team in 2002. UC Irvine senior outside hitter Jimmy Pelzel was named to the second-team this year and was a first-team selection in 2003.
The selections were made by the AVCA Men's Volleyball All-America Committee: chairperson Mark Pavlik (Penn State); Sean Byron (Rutgers-Newark); Jeff Campbell (Cal State-Northridge); Fred Chao (George Mason); Dave Deuser (Lewis); Tim Koth (Quincy); Ron Larsen (UC San Diego); Joel Walton (Ball State); and Joe Wortmann (Pacific).
Winters graduated May 1, 2004, from Pepperdine and is currently training with Team Canada.
