After defeating Tarleton State University Tuesday night Oct. 25, the Wildcat volleyball team has now won three in a row and completed a sweep of Texas A&M University-Commerce, Texas Women’s University, and TSU all at Moody Coliseum.
ACU beat the TexAnns 3-1 (25-23, 17-25, 25-20, and 26-24) and stopped TSU from forcing a fifth set by dramatically coming back after being down 23-19 in the fourth.
The ‘Cats improved to 16-11 overall and 10-5 in the Lone Star Conference. Tarleton falls to 14-13 and 8-7, fourth in the LSC standings behind ACU who is third.
Head coach Kellen Mock was more than pleased with the girl’s efforts.
“Tarleton is an evenly matched team versus us,” Mock said. “I was excited with how we out hustled them.”
The Wildcats kept themselves from entering the fifth set when the TexAnns fell victim to three straight attacking errors bringing the score to 23-22, TSU. The ‘Cats then gave Tarleton a two point advantage on an error. A kill from Sara Oxford and a key block from Jennie Hutt and Neely Borger tied the game at 24-24.
The following play showed the kind of effort ACU has put forth in the second half of the season.
Tarleton’s Flynn Harrell hit a ball that immediately sunk into the front court however, a Wildcat defender rushed to it getting just enough hand on the ball to pop it back over the net. The TexAnns not expecting a return, couldn’t recover the ball cleanly.
“We have pushed these girls as hard as we could,” said Mock. “It’s working for us and I’m glad to see the fight the team has responded with.”
Junior Kalynne Allen agreed with Mock.
“We’ve been practicing hard in order to overcome adversity,” Mock said. “To dig ourselves out of a hole is awesome. We showed a lot of heart.”
The coaching staff of Tarleton argued the point but to no avail. The Wildcats have advanced to 9-4 since the West Texas A&M University match on Sept. 22 and this win was their sixth out of the last seven matches.
Oxford tied a career high of 20 kills on 42 attempts. She also had a team best .333 hitting percentage. In game one she rallied off four consecutive points that ended a 19-19 tie.
Mock said Oxford was all over the court on Tuesday.
“Sara was able to do something productive no matter where the ball was. She is a difficult hitter for opponents to stop and has come a long way thus far.”
“Everyone is shining right now,” Mock said. “We’ve overcome a lot of adversity. It’s fun to see one player have a great match and the other girls rally behind her.”
Oxford contributed defensively as well with four blocks. Borger, co-conference defensive player of the week, had five of the team’s nine deflections.
Setter Haley Rhoads recorded 50 or more assists for the fourth-straight time in addition to nine digs.
The ‘Cats hit .170 as a team while Tarleton hit a similar .167.
Kelsie Edwards led ACU with 20 digs. Hutt and Allen were not far behind with 13 and Madelyn Robinett put up 12.
The Wildcats go back on the road to Eastern New Mexico University and play at 2 p.m. (CST) on Saturday, Oct. 29.
Allen emphasized the importance the ENMU game has on the rest of the season.
“Saturday is a big game. ENMU was a turning point in our first meeting. It would be good to win going into the last week of conference matches.”
“The team is peaking at a good point,” Allen said. “We’re sharing roles evenly. It’s exciting to be a tight-nit group at this point in the season because its changed how we play on the court and the overall results have been obvious.”
