Spikers dominate middle in win over UI
Utah State’s middle blockers led the charge in the Aggies’ win over the University of Idaho Saturday.
Two Aggie middle blockers combined for 28 of USU’s 51 kills, with only one error.
Erin Cartwright led all players, racking up 17 kills while hitting a career-high .607 with no errors. Ingrid Roth hit .714 with a career-high 11 kills and one error.
Cartwright also had eight block assists while Roth had six.
“Another great performance by our middles,” said Aggie Head Coach Burt Fuller. “Ingrid and Erin did a tremendous job and our setters did a tremendous job of getting them the ball.”
The Aggie passers received much of the credit for the performance in the middle.
“The passers are awesome,” Cartwright said. “That’s the only way we can run our middles, [is] if we pass the ball and we passed great tonight.”
A defensive presence
The Aggie defense came up big, and was able to slow down an Idaho team that had won four of its last five matches.
“As a whole, I think we played awesome defense,” said Aggie defensive specialist Lesley Hudson. “We stopped them. We blocked a lot of balls, too. I think it made a huge difference, stopping their offense and their big hitters.”
One player the Aggies were able to slow down was Vandal middle blocker Anna-Marie Hammond. Hammond was named Big West Player of the Week last Monday after picking up 25 kills in Idaho’s victory over Pacific, Oct. 19.
Although Hammond finished with 10 kills in the three-game match against USU, she only hit .182, and through two games was hitting zero with only four kills.
“It was nice to see us slow down some pretty good middles who have had some pretty good numbers,” Fuller said. “We touched a lot of balls and we dug some balls, and that kind of took them out of their offensive flow.”
A new start
After going 3-6 in the first half of Big West conference play, the Aggies opened the second half with a victory, and are looking to turn their record around.
“We kind of see it as a new start,” said Aggie opposite Hailey Seedall. “We get to play a lot of teams we lost to at home now, and we’re excited. It’s kind of a different feel at home.”
The Aggies will host Cal Poly, UC Santa Barbara, Cal State Northridge and Pacific – four teams they lost to previously this season.
Fuller said the team’s goal is to improve to .500 in conference play.
“We have a lot of work to do to come back,” he said. “If we can turn around and go 6-3 this half and make that kind of turnaround, we know we’ve improved.”
Quotables
“We were really pumped up for this game. We were excited. They just beat Pacific, and it’s a big deal for us to beat these guys.” – Aggie opposite Hailey Seedall on playing Idaho.
“I was just on tonight, I guess. I was just feeling it.” – Aggie middle blocker Erin Cartwright on her match against Idaho.
Big West Conference Standings
Conference Overall
W L W L
UC Santa Barbara 11 0 21 0
Long Beach State 8 3 18 3
Pacific 8 3 13 8
Cal Poly 8 3 9 10
Cal State Northridge 5 6 10 9
UC Irvine 4 6 11 9
Utah State 4 6 10 10
Idaho 4 6 8 12
UC Riverside 2 9 6 10
Cal State Fullerton 0 11 4 20
By the numbers
90 – Minutes in Saturday’s match.
71.4 – Aggie Ingrid Roth’s attack percentage.
28 – Erin Cartwright attack attempts.
17 – Kills by match leader Erin Cartwright.
15 – Total blocks for USU.
11 – Aggie margin of victory in the second
game.
6 – Matches swept by Utah State this season.
5 – Aggie service aces.
4 – Straight victories by USU over Idaho.
0 – Hitting percentage for Idaho’s Anna-
Marie Hammond in the first two games.
-slbk5@cc.usu.edu