Friday, October 01, 2010

WNCC volleyball sweeps Lamar Community College

Western Nebraska Community College’s Ariel Austin pounded home 10 kills and the No. 5-ranked Cougar volleyball team swept past Lamar Community College 25-16, 25-14, 25-17 Friday at Cougar Palace.

The win was the Cougars 22nd of the year and moved their sub-region record to 3-0. WNCC will finish the weekend home stand with a sub-region contest against Trinidad State Junior College Saturday at 1 p.m.

Austin said they play pretty consistent today, except for the fact that they committed 14 service errors. Lamar committed just two service errors in the contest.

“We were pretty consistent the whole match; we just have to work on our serves,” the 6-foot rightside hitter from Woodland Park, Colo., said. “Serving is what we have been working on all year and tonight it affected us. But, overall, our passing and hitting was really good. We also played defense well.”

Lamar is a much improved ball club over previous years and Friday night they battled the Cougars tough. In the first set, WNCC held a slim 7-6 lead and couldn’t put distance between themselves and the Lopes on the scoreboard.

Finally, Fernanda Goncalves went on a three-point service run, including a huge kill by Tania Torres to put WNCC up 20-13. The Cougar continued playing strong as Lais Soares had two kills and Austin rifled a 90 fastball in for a point to help WNCC take a 25-16 win.

WNCC took control of the second set early as the Cougars had a block party at the net. WNCC recorded five strong blocks, including a series of three blocks to help the Cougars to an 8-3 lead. The Cougars pushed the lead to 16-7 on two kills by Debora Araujo before Lamar’s Brittany Higgins served two points to cut the deficit to 16-10.

The comeback was short lived as Araujo had two service points and Torres pounded home another two kills. Finally, Kathryn Stock served an ace as the Cougars captured the second set 25-14.

The third set was a dogfight as Lamar pushed the Cougars to the limit early on. Lamar held an 8-6 lead before an Araujo kill and three Goncalves service points gave WNCC a 10-8 lead. WNCC upped the lead to 13-10, but the Lopes fought back on a service point by Higgins and then two straight points by Ayanna Lindborg to knot the score at 15-15.

After a WNCC timeout, Austin hammered home another smoking kill and followed by Sierra Schmidt four straight service points for a 20-15 lead. Emily Hoehn finished off the Lopes with two service points as Torres got the winning block for the final point of the game.

Austin paced the Cougars with 10 kills and two blocks, while Araujo and Soares each had nine kills. Araujo also had three blocks, nine digs and six points; while Soares had four blocks.

Also for the Cougars, Torres had five kills, two blocks, and four points; Goncalves had 10 points, 35 set assists, and two kills; Stock had eight kills, 16 digs and seven points; Schmidt had one kill, two digs and six points; and Hoehn had 10 digs and three points.

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