Oct. 27, 2009

Box Score

Sacramento, Calif. - For the first time in 2009 the Pacific women's volleyball team suffered a three-set loss, dropping a decision to Sacramento State on the road on Tuesday, October 27. The loss dropped the Tigers to 15-6 overall while the Hornets improved to 15-11 on the season.

Set scores for the match were: 25-21, 25-23, 25-21.

Coming off a tough five set loss on the road last Friday, the Tigers were unable to rebound on the road against the Hornets in the Nest as Sacramento State handed Pacific its worst loss of the season to date. Out of the gate, the Tigers fell into a hole they would not be able to overcome, falling behind 17-8 early in the set before rallying back to within two late in the set. Pacific's rally was sparked by the insertion of freshman Pihanakealoha Kea (Honolulu, Hawaii) who entered the match. With Kea in the match the Tigers rolled out a 10-3 run to push the score to 20-18, however, the rally would be for not as the Hornets held off the Tigers to take the set 25-21.

With the momentum from the first set rally, the Tigers came out firing in the second set running out to an early lead and pushing it to its largest point of five at 13-8 which forced the Hornets to use their first timeout of the set. The timeout would prove to be the all Sacramento State would need to slow down the Tigers run as the Hornets came out of the break with a 9-4 run that knotted the set at 17-17 and put the momentum squarely back in their hands. From their both teams traded points until the Hornets were able to end the set with a pair of points to steal away the set.

Down in a deep two sets to zero hole, the Tigers were unable to rally against the Hornets in what would be the third and final set as the Hornets were able to use a 6-0 run against the Tigers late to turn a 19-16 advantage for Pacific into a 22-19 hole. For the Hornets, Desiree Hoyum did the damage at the beginning of the run, knocking down three straight kills to tie the set at 19-19 while the Tigers did their own damage against themselves for the final three points with three straight attacking errors.

For the match, senior Masha Vaysburg (Livermore, Calif.) tied her career high in kills with 10 on the night as she posted a .421 hitting percentage. Defensively, senior Natalia Tomaszewska (Marklowice, Poland) set a career-best with two solo blocks and was one off her career high for total blocks as she finished with seven total blocks. Kea, tallied a career-best 26 assists as the setter for the Tigers while also adding a career-high two kills on seven dump attempts. As a team the Tigers hit just .134 posting 35 kills with 17 errors on 134 attacks.

The Hornets finished the match hitting .233 as a team with 49 kills and 18 errors on 133. Defensively, the team kept the Tigers' attack in check from the back row as they posted 73 digs in just three sets. Hoyum tallied 13 kills while hitting .300 while also posting 18 digs. Eryn Kirby finished right behind Hoyum with 11 kills.

Pacific will be back in action on Friday, October 30 as the team hosts UC Riverside at the Alex G. Spanos Center at 7:00 pm. During the match the Tigers will be wearing pink in recognition of breast cancer awareness month.