USU volleyball puts the clamps on Vandals
Winners of four of its last five matches, the University of Idaho women’s volleyball team was on a roll heading into its match against Utah State University.
Once the match started, the Aggies were on a roll as USU hit .405 in the first game en route to a 30-27, 30-19, 30-25 sweep of Idaho Saturday night in the Spectrum.
With the victory, USU (10-10, 4-6 in Big West Conference play) moved into a tie with Idaho (8-12, 4-6) for seventh place in the BWC.
“This is definitely one of our top [matches], because we played together [and] we had fun on the court,” said Aggie libero Lesley Hudson. “You could just tell we wanted it, and wanted to win.”
The Aggies certainly played like they wanted it, out-hitting the Vandals .316-.182, and dominating them at the net as they finished the match with 20 more block assists than Idaho (30-10).
Much of USU’s success in Saturday’s match can be credited to a solid week of practice, said USU Head Coach Burt Fuller.
“We’ve had a good week of practice, and we were really looking forward to carrying that over [to the match],” he said.
One area of practice senior Hailey Seedall said the Aggies worked on was scouting the Vandals’ hitting tendencies, especially that of reigning Big West Player of the Week Anna-Marie Hammond.
It paid off.
Although Hammond finished with a team-high 10 kills, she was neutralized by the Aggie defense the first two games, finishing with as many attacking errors (4) as kills. Much of this can be credited to USU’s success blocking the ball, Seedall said, as the Aggies easily surpassed their previous high for team blocks in a three-game match.
“We watched video [Saturday], and we also at practice focused on what their hitters like to do,” Seedall said. “That helped us out a lot, because we kind of knew where they were going.”
However, both defenses struggled in the first game. USU’s Erin Cartwright, Tereza Cernianska and Ingrid Roth all hit over .500 in game one and combined for 13 kills as USU hit a whopping .405.
On the other side of the court, Idaho’s Laura McCaffrey and Megan Brown had five kills apiece, and combined to hit .529, leading the Vandals to a hitting percentage of .303.
With the score knotted at 27-27, the Aggies captured the momentum.
Following a Sarah Meek service error, USU freshman Jenna Jordan took advantage of a heavy serve by Zuzana Cernianska, giving the Aggies a 29-27 lead. USU would close out the game on a Seedall kill.
Aggressive serving would help the Aggies out the entire night, Fuller said, by putting the Vandal offense out of position.
“You don’t always have to serve for an ace [to be effective],” he said.
Cartwright said, “They didn’t pass very well tonight, but they also didn’t run their middle as much. We took their middle away, which gives us more blocks on the outside, which helps us out in the long run [by] serving aggressively.”
As for passing on the Utah State side, both Fuller and Seedall said Aggie setters Zuzana and Emily Kennedy played solid matches.
“I give our passers all of the credit,” Seedall said. “They don’t get enough credit, I don’t think, and they passed awesome tonight.”
Like they have the past few matches, it was the Aggie middle blockers who took advantage of the solid passing. Aggie middles Cartwright (17 kills) and Roth (11 kills) combined to hit a scorching .642, with only one attack error
combined.
“Ingrid and Erin did a tremendous job [and] the setters did a tremendous job getting them the ball,” Fuller said.
Despite USU’s dominance on both ends of the court, the Vandals refused to go down without a fight.
After getting routed 30-19 in game two, Idaho came out strong in the third game and held the lead until USU tied it up at
19-19.
With the Aggies clinging to a 23-22 advantage, USU turned to Cartwright and Zuzana, and they
responded.
Cartwright closed the match with four kills – two of which were easy one-timers thanks to big serves by Zuzana.
Utah State will not have much time to enjoy Saturday’s victory as it travels to Salt Lake City Tuesday to take on in-state rival University of Utah at 7 p.m. at Crimson Court.
The Aggies will be looking to snap a two-match losing streak against the No. 22 ranked Utes.
-jasonwturner@cc.usu.edu
Aggie Zuzana Cernianska returns the ball Saturday against Idaho in the Spectrum. (Photo by Cory Hill)