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WNCC ran its record to 35-1 with a hard-fought win over the Rattlers 30-14, 30-22, 30-20, running their win streak to 26 matches.
“I was disappointed in how we played. We didn’t serve very well and we had a lot of break downs on defense,” WNCC coach Chris Green said. “We had a lot of players not in the right spot making a defensive play when they should have been. We came out flat and that is what happens. Otero is a pretty good team and they have some pretty good hitters and we were lucky enough to come out with a win. We want to get better as the season goes along. Hopefully [Saturday] we will play better then we did today.”
For sure this wasn’t one of the Cougars’ best matches as the team tallied 14 missed services, including many back-to-back misses. The team also failed to put any player in double figures in digging, tallying just 25 digs for the match.
“We had a lot of missed serves and we had a lot of serves where we missed two in a row. That is one thing we really preach about is not having a missed serve followed by another missed serve,” Green said. “We weren’t too happy about the serving performance and I think it is one of the worst serving games that we have had this year. Defensively, I don’t think we played as well as we could have. Our block wasn’t as effective slowing down there middle attack and our back row defense not making the digs that they should have made. There are a lot of little things we need to improve on tomorrow.”
Still, the Cougars survived on pure talent. Fatima Balza paced the team with 12 kills, four points and five blocks. Aida Bauza also smacked home 10 kills, while Jennifer Eichler finished with nine kills.
Stacie Meisner popped in 18 service points, two aces and four digs, while Nayka Benitez had eight points, four aces and eight digs. Daphine Da Silva finished with seven points, four kills, three blocks and five digs; while Soriana Pacheco had six points, four kills, four blocks, five digs and 38 set assists.
Kendra Schauermann finished with four points and three digs, while Chelsea Lyles had four kills and four blocks.
Early on, Otero seemed as if they had the Cougars number, as they were hanging with the No. 1-ranked team in the nation. Both teams were knotted at 10, and the Rattlers even led 8-7 on a Cheri Lindsay kill.
Things quickly changed. First, it was Schauermann serving up three points. Then, Stacie Meisner sealed the deal for the Cougars, whipping up 13 straight points, including two aces, to put WNCC up 28-13 and the win.
WNCC played a lot better in game two controlling the pace from the get-go. After both teams were tied at 2-2, Benitez put the Cougars up 8-2. Otero came back and sliced the lead in half on a couple occasions, but the Cougars kept the margin at six or more the rest of the game. Eichler finally finished off the game with a monster kill.
The third game was also a battle between two solid South Sub-region opponents. Oteor held two early leads on two Cougar missed serves. WNCC battled back on three service points by Meisner.
Otero wouldn’t bite, as they clawed themselves back into the contest, slicing the lead to 11-8 and later 15-10. The Cougars will to win kept shining as Eichler nailed a kill followed by three Benitez service points for a 19-11 lead. The lead stayed near double-digits the rest of the way until Eichler ended the match on a kill from the rightside.
WNCC will return to action today when they host
“They [NJC] will be coming in here fired up and ready to play,” he said. “We definitely will need to play better then we did tonight if we are going to come away with a win on Tuesday night. Hopefully we can correct the mistakes we made [Saturday] and on Monday when we play
Also, Tuesday night is a special night. It will be Black Out Night with patrons urged to wear black. Tuesday will also be Breast Cancer Awareness night with information and giveaways dealing with breast cancer. Also, breast cancer survivors can call or request a free ticket to the game.
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