Volleyball bites Wolfpack in four sets
Junior opposite side hitter Shay Sorensen recorded 14 kills to lead the Utah State women’s volleyball team to a four-set victory over Nevada on Thursday.
Sorensen finished with a .524 hitting percentage as the Aggies proved too much for the Wolfpack to handle.
“Shay played great,” head coach Grayson DuBose said. “Everything she hit was money. She did a nice job. Paige (Neves) did a nice job finding her.”
Nevada started the match on fire offensively, racing to a 5-1 advantage from four kills and a service ace. The lead might have been larger, but the Wolfpack gave up the lone point on a service error.
The Aggies used a 4-0 run to knot the game, and the first set went back and forth as the largest lead for either team was four, but it was USU that scratched out the 26-24 set victory.
Utah State controlled the tempo from start to finish in the second set, jumping out to the early lead, and steadily building its advantage throughout.
The Aggies led by as many as seven, and the Wolfpack struggled to contain Utah State’s triple threat of Sorensen, senior outside hitter Liz McArthur and junior opposite side hitter Josselyn White.
McArthur finished the second set off with a kill and a service ace, to give the Aggies a 2-0 advantage.
“We did a nice job of controlling the tempo,” DuBose said. “We served those guys out of system, and I thought we served tough. It was really positive.”
The Wolfpack jumped out to a big lead and controlled the tempo to start the third set, but this time they weren’t going to let the Aggies back into it. Leading 5-0, Nevada gave up three straight points.
The Aggies got to within two at 8-6, but Nevada utilized an 11-5 run to open up a commanding eight-point advantage. Nevada got 12 kills from each Elissa Ji and Tessa Lea’ea, and the Wolfpack avoided the sweep and took the third set 25-16.
The Aggies dominated the fourth set. With the score knotted at 4’s, USU scored 21 of the final 27 points en route to a 25-10 fourth-set blowout and a 3-1 victory.
McArthur and White finished with 13 and 10 kills, respectively, and the team finished with 23 block assists and a .260 hitting percentage.
“It was a really nice night by all of us — a really nice night for everybody,” DuBose said. “I think the third set we didn’t come out as focused as we should have been, but we regained our composure and finished with one error on 27 swings, in that fourth set.”
The win was DuBose’s first at Nevada in his six seasons at Utah State.
“It kind of makes it more fun for me,” DuBose said.
With the win the Aggies improved to 12-15 on the season and 7-6 in Western Athletic Conference play.
Nevada falls to 5-20 overall and 2-11 in WAC play.
USU travels to Fresno State on Saturday, Nov. 12.
“It’d be nice to make a run and get some momentum into and through the tournament,” DuBose said.
– curtis.lundstrom@aggiemail.usu.edu