Washington State University Athletics
Volleyball Loses at No. 2 UW
November 29, 2015 | Volleyball
SEATTLE -- In the conference finale of the 2015 season, the Washington State volleyball team (16-16 overall, 5-15 Pac-12) fell in set scores of 25-14, 25-15, and 25-17 at No. 2 Washington (28-2 overall, 18-2 Pac-12) Saturday night in Seattle before 5,213 fans at Alaska Airlines Arena.
Junior Kyra Holt led WSU with nine kills and eight digs. Sophomore Casey Schoenlein added seven kills, hit .312 and had three blocks. Freshman Claire Martin had five kills, hit .400 and had two blocks. Junior Ashley Vander Tuig and freshman McKenna Woodford each had four kills while Vander Tuig led the Cougars with five blocks. Haley MacDonald set up 24 assists and Kate Sommer had 11 digs, taking her school record total to 1,954 career digs.
The Huskies were led by the 11 kills and .526 hitting percentage of Courtney Schwan while Tia Scambray added 10 kills. Katy Beals led the team with 11 digs while Cassie Strickland and Bailey Tanner added 10 digs each. Beals and Strickland combined for 40 assists. Lianna Sybeldon had six kills, hit .385 and led had five blocks. Melanie Wade and Strickland each had two aces.
Washington, tied for the conference championship with USC, hit .351 for the match and held WSU to a .157 hitting percentage. The Cougars led the match with eight blocks to the Huskies six but the home team served six aces and held with ace-less.
UW took charge early in the opening set, hitting .485 as a team to take the 25-14 win. In the second set, the Cougars scored three consecutive points to tie at nine, but the Huskies scored four straight for a 16-12 lead. UW then out-scored the visitors nine to three for the 25-15 win. UW led 18-7 when WSU scored seven straight points in the third set to close the gap to 18-14. The Huskies closed out the set, 25-17, and took the match 3-0.
“This is a very, very good Washington team. If you are going to beat a team as good as they are, you definitely need to be clicking on all cylinders and we definitely weren't tonight,” WSU Head Coach Jen Greeny said. “We didn't pass well which made our offense pretty predictable and we need our outside hitter to put the ball away more than they did tonight. I think we ended up with sole possession of ninth, our best finish so that's definitely a positive. There were so many close matches that I wish we could get back - Arizona and USC and a couple others as well that didn't go out way. Our young team is learning from that and we can take all those experiences and get better this spring.”
Reflecting on the career of the lone Cougar senior on the squad, Greeny said, “Kate Sommer is fantastic. It has been a pleasure to coach her and we will definitely miss her. She's hilarious and a sparkplug! I know she will be successful in anything she does. I think she's left a great legacy for this team.”
Other statistical notes about the 2015 Cougar volleyball team:
Junior Haley MacDonald's career 2,724 assists is fifth-best in school records.
Junior Kyra Holt's career 1,293 kills is sixth-best, 91 aces is eighth-best and 1,486.5 points is second-best in school records.
Five conference wins equals Coach Greeny's 2013 total, which was 11th place.
