MIAMI - In a battle of the two hottest teams in the Sun Belt Conference
Tournament this week, the Western Kentucky volleyball squad emerged
with the championship as they picked up a
3-0 (25-21, 25-20, 25-19) victory over the University of New Orleans
on Saturday
afternoon.
WKU
(26-9), an NCAA tournament participant a year ago, will head back after
claiming the automatic bid by virtue of their win. Megan Argabright had
12 kills for the match while Aquila Orr hit .370 with 10 kills. Julia
Noe led all setters with 33 assists while Kelly Hofmeyer had a
match-high 20 digs.
Lindsey Loyd pace the UNO (22-10) efforts
with a double-double performance tallying 10 kills and 13 digs. Cassidy
Asebroek had a team-high 24 assists while Maria Szivos totaled 10 digs
to join Loyd with double-figure digs.
WKU had the early
advantage at 8-5 in the opening set, before the momentum swung in the
favor of the Privateers, who scored 9 of 13 points to take a 14-12
lead. After the brief lead by UNO, the Hilltoppers grabbed the lead at
17-16 and did not fall out of the driver's seat the remainder of the
opening stanza.
A late tie at 20 would be as close as UNO
would get to WKU as the Hilltoppers scored 5 of 6 to close out the
frame. Bowden has 5 kills while Argabright and Orr have four apiece as
WKU hit .382 to UNO's .152 in the set.
The Privateers went up
5-4 to start the second frame before WKU scored the next three points,
forcing UNO head coach Jozsef Forman to call a timeout.
The
advantage reached seven points for the Hilltoppers at 20-13 as the WKU
offense was hitting .600 to just .152 for the Privateers during the run
in which they built their lead to seven. The Hilltoppers entered the
break with a 2-0 lead after a 25-20 victory, despite their hitting in
the stanza cooling off to .270.
In the third set, the two teams
were knotted at 16 points apiece, before WKU made their final push of
the weekend. The Hilltoppers scored five straight points to take a
commanding lead at 21-16 as the Privateers would not challenge WKU for
the remainder of the set as they needed just two match points to close
out the championship with a 25-19 win.
Dobrilla Kovacevic and Loyd were named to the all-tournament team following the completion of the match.
