College of Charleston 3, Elon 0
Charleston, S.C.- The College of Charleston volleyball team defeated Elon, 3-0, which was the sixth shut-out of the season for the Cougars. With the win, Charleston improved to 8-5 over and 3-0 in the SoCon, while Elon fell to 8-5 and 2-1 in conference play.
“It was a great way to end a good week of volleyball,” Head Coach Jason Kepner said. “The team played very well today. We had a balanced offense and really blocked aggressively. It’s nice to start 3-0 in the conference. We have a full week of practice before we go on the road next weekend.”
Charleston opened game one with a service ace by senior Megan Parkerson which began the Cougars 5-1 run. With the Cougars leading 26-12, Elon was forced to take a timeout. Charleston went on to win game one 30-17.
In game two, Charleston opened with another impressive run, scoring seven unanswered points, which caused Elon to take another timeout. The Cougars opened their lead to 19-7, but Elon narrowed the lead to 22-17. After a Cougar timeout, the team regrouped, went on an 8-3 run and took game two 20-30.
The final game of the match saw Charleston jump out to another early lead. Trying a new offensive stategy Elon played sophomore Emily Regan in place of senior Natlie Moore at setter. In addition Elon’s top returning hitter, Britany Westphal did not play in the third game until the 20-13 mark. The change kept the score closer than the two previous games as the Cougars largest lead was held to eight points.
Leading the Cougars offensively was senior Annie Uthe who had 11 kills and team high .647 attack percentage. Tiffany Blum and Emily Sawin tallied 10 kills a piece. Whitney Russell, Deanna Patrick, and Cole Dawley added six kills each. The Cougar defense was led by Blum who tallied seven block assists.
For Elon, the offense was led by Emily Lucci with nine kills. Britany Westphal (7), Jessica Barrow (6), Lauren Copenhagen (5) and Mandy Wilson (5), and Sarah Schermerhorn (4) all added kills in the effort. Defensively for the Phoenix, Kelley Blakewood had 14 digs and Lucci had five block assists and seven digs.
Charleston returns to action next weekend when they travel to North Carolina to take on Davidson Friday at 7 p.m. and Appalachian State Saturday at 2 p.m.
Georgia Southern 3, Wofford 2
SPARTANBURG, S.C. --- The Georgia Southern volleyball team got back on the winning track with an extremely close 3-2 (25-30, 30-27, 31-29, 29-31, 15-13) victory over Wofford Sunday afternoon at Benjamin Johnson Arena.
The win snaps an eight-match losing streak dating back to Sept. 1. The Eagles improve to 4-12 and 1-3 in the Southern Conference while the Terriers drop to 6-8 and 0-2.
“Today was a great team win for us,” said GSU head coach Nicole McCray. “Everyone played their part and gave 100 percent and we were fortunate to come out with a win.”
Four of the five games were decided by three points or less and the last three were by two each.
After the two teams split the first two frames, Georgia Southern took a 2-1 lead by scoring the last eight points of the third game. A service error gave Wofford a 29-23 advantage, but freshmen Sarah Gildersleeve (Naples, Fla.) and Laura Beth Lancaster (Ocala, Fla.) combined for six kills, with Lancaster providing the final point. It was Wofford’s turn to rally in game four, saving a match point at 29-28 before Joanna Suddath and Liz Sheets combined on a block to go up one. A GSU error tied the match at 2-2.
Freshman Michelle Uzoh (San Antonio, Texas) and junior Bianca Julio (Curitiba, Brazil) had two blocks each in the deciding game. Junior Christy Dowd (Indianapolis, Ind.) closed out the hard-fought match with her 11th kill. “We made plays in game five,” added McCray. “We blocked balls at the end and had some great defense.”
GSU senior Gorana Bacic (Richmond, Va.) led all players with a season-high 16 kills. Julio added 13 and Dowd had 11. Junior Mae Chabra (Mt. Pleasant, S.C.) dished out 53 assists and senior Bailey Coleman (Mt. Pleasant, S.C.) totaled 20 digs. “This is what we needed,” said McCray. “We needed to get the monkey off our back. We are on a mission and hungry right now, which will hopefully help us finish conference play a lot better than we started.”
For Wofford, Anna Gustafson and Liz Sheets recorded 14 and 13 kills, respectively. Sarah Palmer tallied 25 digs.
Georgia Southern returns home next weekend when they host Chattanooga Saturday morning at 11 a.m. and Western Carolina Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m.
Chattanooga 3, Davidson 0
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. ? Senior middle blocker Leslee Ball (Sycamore, Ill.) recorded a match-high tying 14 kills and senior setter Bethany Herndon (Richmond, Texas) posted a team-high 31 assists to lead Chattanooga (7-6, 3-0) to a 3-0 victory over Davidson (5-10, 0-2) Sunday afternoon at Maclellan Gym in Chattanooga, Tenn. The Lady Mocs move to 3-0 in the Southern Conference with wins of 30-27, 30-21 and 30-25 and remain in a first place tie with the College of Charleston. The win is Chattanooga’s fifth straight victory and fourth consecutive shutout.
The first half of Game 1 featured six ties and four lead changes as the Lady Mocs battled out to a 12-11 advantage before three errors by the Wildcats extended the lead to 15-11. Chattanooga would maintain a lead of at least three points until Davidson rallied to close to within 22-21 on a kill and three UTC errors. The Lady Mocs quickly pulled back ahead, 26-22, with a 4-1 run fueled by two Ball kills and held on for a 30-27 victory to go up 1-0 in the match.
Game 2 was a vastly different story as Chattanooga came out strong and jumped out to a 9-2 lead before Davidson closed to 18-9. The Wildcats would register back-to-back points to make the score 18-11 but that would be as close as they would get the rest of the game as the Lady Mocs maintained at least a seven point lead before closing out the game with a 30-21 victory.
Down 2-0 in the match, Davidson fought back in the third game as they battled out to leads of 14-12 and 17-15. The Wildcats eventually extended to a 22-19 lead before a game-changing 7-0 run by Chattanooga put the Lady Mocs ahead 26-22. From there they would registers four consecutive kills, two by senior outside hitter Jamie Engel (Troy, Ill.) to close out the game, and the match, with a 30-25 victory.
Freshman setter Hayley Lawson paced the offense with a match-high 34 assists and added 15 digs while senior outside hitter Katie Pierucci finished with a match-high tying 14 kills as well as 12 digs. Senior libero Lindsay Woeste led the defense with a team-high 19 digs and was joined by freshman defensive specialist Jennifer Chamblee with 10 digs. Junior middle blocker Kittery Neale rounded out the offensive attack with 12 kills while junior middle blocker Alison Dwyer added nine kills.
For the Lady Mocs, in addition to the performances of Ball and Herndon, junior libero Lara Newberry (Chattanooga, Tenn.) posted a match-high 24 digs while senior outside hitter Kelsey Amundson (Houston, Texas) added seven kills and 15 digs. Engel finished with seven kills, six digs and a season-high tying four service aces. Herndon and Ball added 10 and eight digs, respectively, in addition to their contributions offensively and junior setter Michaela Huff (Dallas, Texas) added 13 digs.
The Lady Mocs’ string of four consecutive shutouts represents only the third time that the program has recorded at least four straight shutouts and the first since 1986. That season, the fourth year squad shutout its first six opponents from September 5-13 and shutout nine of its first 10 opponents. The only other occurrence was in the program’s first year when Chattanooga shutout four teams on September 24, 1983.
The Lady Mocs will be back in action on Tuesday, September 25, when they host Kennesaw State in the first ever meeting between the two schools. First serve is set for 7 p.m.