Van Compton was surprised at the performance of the team on the other side of the net.
On that late September day in 1994, the seventh-year head volleyball coach watched her Little Rock team drop a five-set match to Oral Roberts, a team the Trojans had always beaten easily.
Something was different about the Oral Roberts team. There were a couple of international players on the roster and the squad had been completely transformed. After the match, Compton went to speak with opposing coach Revis Ward.
"They had two players, one was an outside and one was a middle, and they beat us," Compton said.