Crusaders Sweep Season Series vs. St. Thomas; Take a Split on Sunday and have Clinched a SCAC Tournament Berth
SHERMAN, Texas – The University of Dallas volleyball team secured a spot in the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) Tournament with its night victory on Sunday over University of St. Thomas in five sets. Three of the four matches Dallas (15-18, 8-9 SCAC) played over the weekend went all five frames.
The Crusaders dropped their earlier match of the day to No. 9 Trinity University (29-4, 17-1 SCAC). Their edge over St. Thomas (9-20, 5-13 SCAC) combined with Austin College defeating Centenary College around the same time set the top six tournament teams. Seeding could still be determined depending on the outcome of the Dallas at Austin College match this Tuesday.
MATCH 1 VS. #9 TRINITY
Scores
Set 1: 15-25
Set 2: 24-26
Set 3: 17-25
The Crusaders combined for 15 kills in the first and third sets, while outdoing Trinity in the second set for kills with a 16-15 edge.
UD competed great in the middle set, using six straight points to nip a 9-4 deficit and go up by one. Isabel Garcia (San Antonio, Texas) was serving during the run and had consecutive service aces. The Tigers regained a slight edge until Larissa Ramirez (San Antonio, Texas) started a streak of three points with a kill to make it 19-all.
Anna Stevenson (Dallas, Texas) would have three-of-four UD kills in the next couple rallies to put her team up by one. Andriella Wagner made a kill to give the Crusaders their final lead of the set at 24-23. Trinity responded with the last three points to avoid not having the straight set sweep. Kills by Avery Tuggle and Maggi Linker respectively tied and won the set.
Dallas did counter a 5-0 deficit in the last set with a 7-2 run to knot the score, but the top-10 nationally and third regionally ranked team grabbed the lead for good starting with its own 7-2 scoring stretch.
Abigail Porras (El Paso, Texas) led the team with 12 kills and neared a double-double with nine digs. Stevenson added eight of her own on 19 total attempts and just two hitting errors. Wagner did not commit a hitting error, as she hit .500 with four kills on eight swings. Ramirez notched a double-double with 27 assists and 11 digs. The only other UD player in double-digits for digs was its team leader Ellise Anable's (Phoenix, Ariz.) 12.
Trinity was led offensively by Tuggle with 14 kills to go with a team-high 12 digs. Emily Ellis and Annie Rose Leggett contributed nine and eight kills, respectively. Lexie Acevedo picked up 26 assists. TU finished with 44 kills and hit .301. The Maroon also totaled 50 digs, six service aces, and five blocks.
MATCH 2 VS. ST. THOMAS
Scores:
Set 1: 23-25
Set 2: 25-14
Set 3: 25-20
Set 4: 22-25
Set 5: 15-7
Needing to salvage a split, the Crusaders responded to a difficult two-point loss in the first set and won the next two. This included one by an 11-point margin which was the largest of this SCAC Cross-Divisional for UD. Another solid offensive outing with a trio of players combining for 56 kills, including Stevenson's career-high 19, coupled with 134 digs were standouts in Sunday's result.
The Crusaders allowed the first point of the game, but then scored six-of-eight to go up by three points in the early stages of the opening set. UD led by no more than four but held that margin the majority of the way until the Celts scored four in a row to force a 19-19 tie. Courtney Bates for UST had a kill to bring things within a point and then was part of a block assist with Emily Jaroszewski for the pivotal point. Abigail Porras (El Paso, Texas) stopped the scoring stretch with a kill. After teams traded points a couple times, the Celts broke a 23-23 tie with the last two points.
An 8-2 lead provided Dallas the momentum it needed to tie the sets. Down 1-0, Garcia started a five-point span generated by kills that included three straight by Stevenson. Ellise Anable (Phoenix, Ariz.), who logged a team-high 36 digs, put down the last kill in that stretch and that eventually resulted in a 6-1 start. Anable also was responsible for the kill at 16-6 that first gave the Crusaders their first double-digit margin.
With Ramirez on serve to start the third set, it was another fast start for UD with four points coming and three via a kill by different players. The Crusaders never trailed despite St. Thomas not allowing the margin to grow by more than five in the set. UST did get the score to 18-17, but UD earned seven of the final 10 points to advance up 2-1.
Dallas squandered the narrow, early lead with Jaroszewski, Kelsie Walker, and Alyssa Ajlouny connecting on kills that were part of a 4-0 stretch to make the score 14-14. Five points on the next seven serves favored UD, but even with a 19-16 edge the Celts rose up with three in a row. In the end, they scored six-of-eight points to even the sets at 2-2. The fourth set was the lone one UD did not eclipse double-digits for kills, as it hit a -.057 kill percentage and was edged by the opposing squad, 10-9, for total kills.
An enormous 7-1 run ended the match with Dallas prevailing. This outburst included six straight points that all involved Stevenson with five straight kills. She worked with Porras on a block for the remaining point of that unanswered streak. Stevenson got blocked on the one play that blemished game-changing stretch. Porras concluded the triumph with her 19th kill, which ties her second highest for an individual match this season.
The Crusaders are now 7-2 in matches that go five sets. This is the fourth match in the past five outings to go that length for Dallas.
Porras matched 19 kills with the same number of digs for a double-double. Stevenson tied the team-high in kills, while Dayjah Whyte (Round Rock, Texas) followed with 18. Garcia added nine kills. Ramriez provided a personal-best 62 assists to go with 23 digs for another double-double over the four matches on the weekend. Ramriez also had five kills. A quintet led by Anable contributed double figures to the team's second largest amount of digs this campaign. Behind Anable was Krystyn Pua (Escondido, Calif.) with 29 digs, while the already mentioned Ramirez and Porras provided additional support. Chole Ilagan (Sugar Land, Texas) completed the group with 11. This triple-digit effort in digs was the third this weekend and marks half of the season's total games to surpass the century mark for that category.
UD had help with 11 total blocks that included: six from Stevenson, five for Whyte, four for Anable, and three to Porras. Stevenson's team-high was another game with four block assists and two solo blocks. The sophomore middle hitter put up a team-best 23 points.
St. Thomas was paced by Alaina Lanik with 12 kills and 14 digs for a double-double. A more impressive statistic was one Walker claiming a triple-double with 10 kills, 34 assists, and 24 digs. Kaylyn Latin managed 35 digs to lead a quartet to the team's 112 digs. Alyssa Ajlouny contributed 11 kills and digs for her own double-double. 22 block assists for the team involved three players posting for 16 of them led by Jaroszewski matching Stevenson for total blocks.
SOCIAL MEDIA
#UDCRUSADERS WIN! CLINCHED a spot in the #SCACvb Tournament in 2 weeks with another 5-set match over the weekend! #WeAreUD #d3vb #UDallas pic.twitter.com/jcZYjXFBUn
— UDallas Athletics (@UDallasSports) October 28, 2019
UP NEXT
Dallas finishes its regular season with quick turnaround matches on Tuesday, October 29, at Austin College and Wednesday at Dallas Christian College. Dallas will have played six games over a five-day span by the completion of the matches.