LA JOLLA, Calif. ? The 16th-ranked UC San Diego women's volleyball team made it consecutive five-set wins over ranked opponents with a 20-25, 26-24, 22-25, 25-14, 15-9 win over No. 20 Cal Poly Pomona on Saturday night. The Tritons overcame the conference's top blocking team as the Broncos had 22.5 team blocks. “Getting a second straight victory in a hard fought match against a very good team is a big step for us, said Head Coach Tom Black. “Overall, this was a huge weekend for our program.” UCSD's Sylvia Schmidt led the way with 18 kills on .410 hitting, three aces and five blocks. As a team, the Tritons served up 11 aces and limited CPP to just three.
With the win, UCSD improves to 11-2, 5-1 California Collegiate Athletic Association, while the Broncos drop to 7-4, 4-2 CCAA.
“I was really proud of our team- that it was able to respond from an emotional win last night and get the job done tonight,” said Black. “We had a lot of different players contribute and that's going to be big for us down the line.”
In addition to Schmidt's 18 kills, Hillary Williamson added 12 kills and a team-high 16 digs, and Katie Condon added 10 kills, including the final match-point. Elaine Chen recorded a double-double with 54 assists and 11 digs.
CPP was paced by Elizabeth Diaz with 10 kills. The Broncos scored several points off blocks as Jasmine Davis and Vanessa Williams had 11 blocks apiece, while Allie Newman had nine blocks. Davis ended up with a triple-double with 11 blocks, 10 digs and 29 assists.
The five-set win over CPP gives the Tritons some revenge over last year's five-set loss in Pomona.
The Tritons dropped the first set by five points. The Tritons led 20-18, only to see the Broncos score the final seven points of the set. UCSD had a couple attack errors, paired with two CPP blocks and the Broncos had the first set.
UCSD and CPP found themselves in a close second set as well. UCSD led 16-11 after a CPP attack error. The Broncos rallied to tie the set at 21-21 and take a 23-21 lead on back-to-back blocks. With the Tritons trailing 24-22, Williamson and Condon connected on consecutive kills to tie up the set at 24-24. The Tritons called on Schmidt for a kill, setting up set point, which was sent home by Williamson for the 26-24 win.
In set four, the Tritons saw a 4-1 lead quickly disappear into an 8-6 CPP lead. The Broncos led 17-15 before the Tritons began their run. UCSD took a 20-18 lead on a Williamson kill, forcing the Broncos to call timeout. From that point, CPP scored six straight points to put the set out of reach and CPP had the set 25-22.
Set four was all Tritons. After the score was tied at 4-4, a serving run by Karen Reis, which included an ace, put UCSD up 10-5. With UCSD up 13-11, UCSD scored six straight points off Schmidt serves to take a commanding 19-11 lead. UCSD would go up by as many as 10 points and took the set 25-14. UCSD hit .241 compared to CPP's -.107.
Set five began with the Tritons scoring eight of the first 10 points as Schmidt had three kills and Kimberly Carpenter had two in the stretch. After the team's changed courts, CPP cut the deficit down to 8-4 UCSD. After a solo block by CPP's Davis cut the Triton lead down to 12-7, UCSD got consecutive kills by Carpenter and Williamson to force match point at 14-7. After two CPP points, Chen set Condon for the match ending kill at 15-9.
UCSD is back in action when it heads to northern California next week. UCSD takes on Chico State on Friday, October 3 at 7:00 p.m.
