USU ends BWC play on positive note
The Utah State women’s volleyball team sent its two seniors, Erin Cartwright and Taubi Neves, out of the Spectrum for the last time with a game to be remembered.
The Aggie spikers defeated Cal State Northridge in an intense five-game match, 3-2, breaking records and having fun.
“I thought it was a well-fought match,” said Utah State Head Coach Burt Fuller. “We were really excited to pull that match out.”
Freshman Mari Ruddick said, “Our team is amazing. It is so awesome that we don’t just have one player that we go to every time. I love it when everybody can do awesome when we win it as a team.”
This held true for the match against Northridge as five Aggies recorded double-digit kills.
Zuzana Cernianska led them with 23 winners in the fifth game. However, Cartwright broke the USU record for the most kills in a season, shattering that record early in the first game with her 12 kills, 10 digs and four blocks.
Cartwright now has 471 kills on the season, setting the new single-season kills record at Utah State.
Neves also set a new single-season record as she now has 344 digs, breaking the old mark of 340 set by now assistant coach Heather Olmstead during the 2001 season.
“It felt pretty cool [to get the record],” Cartwright said. “Last year, I just missed it by two kills and I’m just glad that I pulled it off this year. I was really proud of Taubi tonight, she was amazing.”
Ruddick added 15 kills and eight blocks, while fellow freshman Beth Hodge finished with 13 kills and Ingrid Roth recorded 12 kills and a career-high nine blocks.
Neves dominated on defense and led all players in the match with 24 digs.
In the first two games, the Matadors were not playing like what the No. 2 team in the Big West Conference should have looked like.
They had real trouble returning serves, especially from Cernianska, and more times than once, everyone just stayed where they were and watched the ball fall in the middle of the court.
The Aggies dominated the first two games, letting Northridge lead only in the first few points of the second game.
However, USU didn’t let it stay that way long and went on a 15-3 scoring run that put them up 16-9 and helped them stay ahead to win 30-24 during the second game.
“We were hoping to just go out and end it [after the second game], but we decided to let the crowd have a good night instead,” Cartwright said.
The Matadors come back to win the third game, riding on the backs of juniors Jennifer Fopma and Jen Ryan.
Ryan had 10 kills, hitting strong on the right side, and Fopma landed seven kills to put the Matadors up 30-25 for the win in game three.
The fourth game was frustrating for the Aggies, with some very controversial calls by the officials late in the game that infuriated Fuller and Northridge’s Head Coach Jeff Stork.
Most of game four was dominated by Northridge. The Aggies would seem to be making a comeback, would catch up, but then would lose it again.
“There were a couple of great comebacks in game four to catch them, but then we got stuck,” Fuller said. “We couldn’t finish off the match.”
The Aggies didn’t get ahead until Hodge made an incredible kill and put USU up 28-27. After that, the game went back and forth.
Utah State fought hard with some great blocks from Cartwright and setter Andrea Delsigne, but because of a kill from Ryan and then another controversial call from the officials, Northridge won the game, 36-34.
“After game four we were quite disturbed,” Hodge said. “But we came back and took our aggressions out on the other team.”
Cartwright said, “We were angry after game three, but after four we were just mad.”
However, the Aggies were able to get their frustration under control and come out and win the fifth game 15-11 and the match 3-2 for a win in the final home match of the season.
-aedmunds@cc.usu.edu