The volleyball team will look for its first win in Southland Conference play Saturday as they face Texas A&M-Corpus Christi in Moody Coliseum.
The Wildcats will enter the game with a record of 0-6 in conference coming off a three-set loss against Sam Houston State last Saturday (30-28, 29-27 and 25-20). This loss put ACU at 2-17 overall for their 2014 season.
ACU put up a good fight in the first two sets in which there were 21 ties and 17 lead changes in the first set alone. The Wildcats had set point a total of five times throughout the match, all of which were in the first two sets.
Sam Houston’s offense thrived on coming from behind, as they were able to not only tie the game every time ACU had set point, but go on to defeat the Wildcats and clinch the win.
The Bearkats’ offense was led by Deveney Wells-Gibson, senior outside hitter from San Antonio, with 19 kills. Wells-Gibson contributed three out of the five times her team came back to tie the game from the Wildcats’ set point.
Despite the loss, ACU outblocked Sam Houston 8.0 to 3.0 led primarily by Lexi Mercier, sophomore middle blocker from Centennial, who recorded three blocks for the night.
As for the Wildcats’ offense, Jennie Loerch, junior outside hitter from Georgetown, led her team with 11 kills for ACU. The Wildcats hit .157 as a whole.
Corpus Christi will enter the game 3-2 in conference after coming off a four-set win over Northwestern State last Saturday (25-16, 19-25, 25-19 and 25-23).
The Islanders’ offense was led by Brianna Brink, senior right side from Corona, California, with 19 kills and 11 digs. Brink has had an impressive outing with 3.38 kills per set and is hitting .211 for her senior year.
Corpus Christi’s defense recorded 57 digs in the game against Northwestern led primarily by Ivy Baresh, junior outside hitter from Arlington, who had 15 digs for the night. She was followed closely by Hailey King, junior defensive specialist from New Braunfels, with 14 digs. Kate Klepetka, freshman defensive specialist from Allen, matched Brink with 11 digs as well.
“We are going to focus a lot on our transition offense and our blocking,” said Jason Bibler, head coach. “Both things we have struggled at the past week and they are two of our strengths, so we need to get back to doing the things we do very well.”
The game is scheduled to start at 2 p.m.
