The 2009 Missouri State volleyball schedule has been completed and includes a total of 30 matches, 13 of those at Hammons Student Center in Springfield. The schedule includes eight matches against members of the 2008 NCAA Tournament field, four of those on the non-conference slate.

    The season opens August 28-29 in Eugene, Ore., with matches against Eastern Washington, San Francisco and Oregon. The Bears host the Dr. Mary Jo Wynn Invitational a week later at Hammons Student Center, with UC Davis, Stephen F. Austin, Memphis and Mississippi State joining the Bears in the tournament.

    Missouri State’s third tournament takes place Sept. 11-13 in Athens, Ohio. MSU will play Eastern Kentucky, Delaware, Indiana and host Ohio.    

    Conference play begins Sept. 18 at home against Illinois State, and the Bears will play a full 18-match home-and-home Missouri Valley Conference schedule that ends Nov. 21 on the road against those same Redbirds.

    Missouri State’s lone non-conference match after league play begins will be an Oct. 25 trip to IPFW.

    Ticket information can be obtained by calling the Missouri State athletics box office at (417) 836-7678.  

    The 2009 season will be the 14th under head coach Melissa Stokes. Stokes has guided the Bears to a 293-135 mark since since taking over in 1996, and the team has advanced to the NCAA Tournament in five of the last six seasons. Last year, Missouri State fell to Alabama-Birmingham in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.