University of Houston
<b> Marshall </b>
Volleyball Falls to Marshall
10/22/2005 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
Oct. 21, 2005
Marshall - Houston Box Score (PDF)
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HOUSTON - Playing the first of five consecutive matches at home, the University of Houston volleyball team had its five-match winning streak snapped at the hands of Marshall (20-30, 26-30, 30-27, 28-30) on Friday night at the Athletics/Alumni Center.
"We've needed this match tonight to build our confidence," head coach Bill Walton said. "I thought we played a little tight tonight. We have to learn to be confident and not play tight when it's important."
Kariny Ritter led the Cougars (10-9, 5-2 C-USA) with 12 kills and nine digs, while Jaci Gonzalez stretched out for a team-best 23 digs going over the 2,200-dig plateau for her career.
Zuela Adom tied a career-high smacking nine kills and Becca Sartori matched a career-best with seven blocks. Kelli Adams and Jennifer Hohl split the setting duties passing out 19 and 14 assists, respectively.
Marshall (15-5, 7-1 C-USA) came firing on all cylinders taking 10 of the first 13 points of the match. UH chipped away at the seven-point deficit, but the Thundering Herd was too strong taking the opening game, 30-20.
Houston had a chance to even the match grabbing a 25-22 advantage in game two on a Sartori kill, but the Herd went on a 4-0 spurt retaking the lead, 26-25.
After a Houston timeout, a Stephanie Cahill service error evened the game at 26, but another Marshall 4-0 run with kills from Kelly-Anne Billingy and Nickie Sanlin gave the Herd a two-game advantage.
The Cougars regrouped in the locker room and turned up the defensive pressure jumping out to a 19-14 in game three. Marshall got within two points on three seperate occassions, but Houston was ready for the test scoring huge side out after side out forcing a game four, 30-27.
Neither team backed down in the fourth game as the two teams were even on 10 seperate occassions and switched leads five times.
A Millicent Martin kill drew Houston within 27-26. After three consecutive service errors, the Herd had a match-point at 29-27. Hohl snuck the ball over on the second touch to inch the Cougars closer, but Stephanie Cahill closed the door with a kill up the shoot giving Marshall the match, 30-28.
Billingy paced the Herd with a match-high 24 kills on a match-best .367 attack percentage to go along with 12 digs. Katie Stein was one kill short of a triple-double registering 54 assists and 12 digs for the victors.
"We needed to be more discipline about our blocking," Adom said. "Defensively, we were fine. We were digging balls. We just needed to penetrate more on the blocking and stay focused."
Houston will continue C-USA action tomorrow night against East Carolina (13-8, 4-4 C-USA) and will have another opportunity to give head coach Bill Walton his 600th career win.
"It's our first Friday, Saturday match in a while," Walton said. "We're pretty good in that situation. We'll find a way to get this match out of system, and come back tomorrow to take it out on ECU."
First serve against the Pirates is on tap for 7pm at the Athletics/Alumni Center.
Cougar Bytes:
This was the first meeting between Houston and Marshall on the volleyball court ... Houston drops to 5-1 in the month of October ... The Cougars are now 4-3 this season in four-game matches ... Zuela Adom matched a career-best nine kills; the last time Adom had nine kills was against Miami (Sept. 3) ... Adom was the fourth Cougar to go over the 100-kills mark ... Houston falls to 8-2 when Adom attacks at or over a .200 attack percentage ... Kariny Ritter has reached double-digit kills in 12 consecutive matches ... The Cougars are 7-3 this season when Ritter leads in kills ... Ritter is 36 kills shy of reaching 359, her total from all of last season ... Becca Sartori equalled a career-high with seven total blocks ... Sartori, like Adom, last reached that feat against Miami (Sept. 3) ... The Houston native is now 39 block assists away from reaching the Top 10 in the Cougar record books ... Jaci Gonzalez has stretched out for over 20 digs in 10 of her last 11 matches ... Gonzalez also went over 2,200 digs for her career ... She is only one game shy of moving into the No. 5 spot in career games played.
