Washington State University Athletics
Volleyball Drops 3-1 Match to No. 24 Oregon
October 18, 2015 | Volleyball
PULLMAN, Wash. -- It was a record-breaking day for senior Kate Sommer but her Washington State volleyball team (14-6 overall, 3-5 Pac-12) fell to No. 24 Oregon with set scores of 25-17, 22-25, 25-19 and 25-22, Sunday afternoon in Bohler Gym.
The lone Cougar senior, Sommer, from Pacific Palisades, Calif., had 13 digs Sunday to bring her career total to 1,779. She surpassed Kelly Hyder who held the WSU career digs record of 1,773 since 2009.
“I think it's a great accomplishment for sure,” Sommer said. “Any athlete wants to set a record, but it's not necessarily something I always think about. I just think about 'What can I do to give to my team?' so it's nice to see numbers in front of it.”
“I'm really proud of Kate and the whole team effort for Kate to become the all-time digs leader here at Washington State,” WSU Head Coach Jen Greeny said. “She's a great player and she's meant so much to this program. Hopefully we can continue to make that number go up-and-up for the remainder of the season.”
WSU's McKenna Woodford led the team with 13 kills, two aces and had two blocks. Kyra Holt added seven kills and three blocks. Ashley Vander Tuig had six kills, hit .455 and led the team with four blocks. Haley MacDonald had 35 assists and three blocks. Tani Stephens had 10 digs.
Oregon's Martenne Bettendorf led the match with 15 kills and had five blocks. Taylor Agost and Kacey Nady each had 11 kills with Nady adding a match-high six blocks. Chelsey Keoho led the match with 14 digs and Maggie Scott had 48 assists and 10 digs. Oregon hit .167 for the match and held WSU to a .082 hitting percentage. The Ducks had 12.5 blocks and the Cougars had 8.0 team blocks.
“We definitely couldn't get anything going offensively,” Greeny said. “That was a little bit of a function of our passing at the beginning. We definitely need to be more consistent passing-wise. Our outside hitters struggled early and our right sides struggled as well. Oregon's a great team and they did some great things defensively, but we just have to be better.”
This weekend the Cougars travel to the Bay area to play at No. 6 Stanford (11-5, 5-3) Friday, Oct. 23 at 7 p.m., and at California (7-12, 1-7) Sunday, Oct. 25 at 11 a.m. in a match televised on the Pac-12 Networks.
