NEW ORLEANS – The New Orleans Privateers (10-8, 4-2) continue to hold serve at home after a 3-1 (25-18, 15-25, 25-22, 25-23) win over the Texas A&M-Commerce Lions (5-14, 2-4) on Thursday evening at the Human Performance Center.
The Privateers continued their best home start since 2004 as they battled through two tough sets in three and four that featured 17 combined ties and five lead changes.
HOW IT HAPPENED
New Orleans battled from down five points at 16-11 and scored on six straight rallies to take a 17-16 lead. From there, neither team separated until a three-point spurt by New Orleans that featured a reversed call, an attack error and a
Sophia Ewalefo kill.
Texas A&M-Commerce saved two match points from Kaitlyn Breland's serve but the Privateers earned the clinching point out of a called timeout. Ewalefo notched her 16
th kill of the match to help vault the Privateers to victory.
A back-and-forth third set saw the score tied 10 times. At 19-19 though it was New Orleans who raced ahead by scoring on five of the next six rallies. They eventually closed the set with a
Kristi Gomez kill.
New Orleans hit .417 in a highly efficient opening set and did not allow a block in that span. The Lions controlled the pace in the second set as the Privateers had more errors (eight) than kills (seven) in the set.
It was New Orleans who prevailed though as they registered eight total blocks and had eight service aces on the night.
INSIDE THE BOX
Ewalefo had a double-double with 12 digs to go along with 16 kills.
Mauri Carver hit .421 in 19 attempts with 10 kills and was in on seven blocks.
Maite Solabarrieta had 36 assists while
Claire Turner added 10 assists. Solabarrieta also served three aces.
Sheilah Purcell led the way in digs with 26. Solabarrieta and Turner combined for 14 digs on the night. Gomez had nine kills while playing the last two sets.
Chandler Lee and
Sydney Gott each had six kills on the match.
NEXT UP
The Privateers will face Lamar on Saturday at 1 p.m. at the Human Performance Center.
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