ELLENSBURG, Wash. - The 11th-ranked UC San Diego women's volleyball team opened its 2014 season Thursday by splitting a pair of matches at Central Washington's Wildcat Invitational. After a grueling five-set victory over Hawaii Pacific, UCSD was defeated, 3-1, by the host team.
Scores against HPU at Nicholson Pavilion were 25-19, 23-25, 14-25, 25-19 and 17-15 in a match that lasted over two hours. It was the first contest of the season for both squads.
Danielle Dahle (La Mesa/Grossmont HS) recorded a double-double with 12 kills and 14 digs, as did Heidi Sierks, who finished with 46 assists and 16 digs. Caitlin Brenton led the Tritons with 14 kills, while Makensie Bates had a career- and team-high 17 digs.
HPU was paced by Pomai Recca, who totaled a match-high 15 kills to go along with 18 digs. Amanda Moriarty led all players with 23 digs and Haley Doerfler had seven blocks.
Both teams hit poorly with UCSD holding a .147 (55-30-170) to .125 (48-27-168) advantage. The Sharks had a 10-6 lead in blocks and aced the Tritons 11 times.
The fifth and deciding set was tied at 15-15 before UCSD closed it out with two straight points. Amanda Colla's (Carlsbad/San Dieguito Academy) kill gave the lead back to the Tritons and an attack error by the Sharks ended the marathon match.
There were 20 tie scores and just six lead changes during the match, none in the fourth or fifth sets.
The scores in the nightcap were 25-9, 23-25, 25-8 and 25-13 in favor of CWU. The Tritons dropped to 1-1 with the loss while the Wildcats improved to 2-0.
UCSD struggled offensively, posting a miserable .017 attack percentage with 32 kills and 30 errors in 118 attempts. Conversely, Central Washington hit .268 (43-13-112) and had 13 service aces to the Tritons' one.
UCSD hit an impressive .467 (15-1-30) in set two, but swung in the negative in each of the other three sets.
Brenton had a team-high seven kills, while Bailey Turk totaled eight digs.
For the Wildcats, Kaitlin Quirk had six kills, five aces and six blocks for 14.5 points. Linden Firethorne posted a match-high 13 kills and Kaely Kight had 16 digs.
All 13 eligible players saw floor time for the young Tritons against CWU.
"We made too many errors in every way possible tonight," said UCSD head coach Ricci Luyties. "We were shown by a good team that we need to work on a lot of things. I think this can motivate us to keep working hard and play a more consistent style of volleyball. We have a lot of new players on the court and we need to strive to play as a cohesive unit."
Tournament action concludes Friday as UCSD plays Saint Martin's (12:30 p.m.) and No. 12 Western Washington (5:30 p.m.). Both matches will be covered by live stats.
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