Cougs Dig Out Of First-Game Hole To Win
Still going …
The No. 9-ranked Washington State women’s volleyball team won its 12th straight match Thursday night as the Cougars defeated the No. 17 Washington Huskies 7-15, 15-6, 15-2, 15-10 in front of 2,873 fans at a rowdy Bohler Gym.
Bohler will continue to sway when border-rival Idaho takes on WSU (5-0 Pac-10, 12-0 overall) Saturday night at 7 in non-conference match. Last year, the Vandals defeated WSU 3-1 at UI’s Memorial Gym.
To the staunchest of WSU’s volleyball supporters, revenge may be in their hearts and minds when the Vandals pay a return visit.
But coach Cindy Fredrick and the Cougars aren’t concerning themselves with revenge, records, statistics, personal achievements or anything else that might detract from the overall mission of this squad.
“It’s important for us to play our game,” Fredrick said. “We take one match at a time.”
As far as the Huskies were concerned, Fredrick thought the Cougars were focused a little bit too much on UW’s middle-blocking duo of Makare Desilets and Leslie Tuiasosopo, each of whom stands 6-feet-2.
Washington (2-3, 6-6) is still a tough unit, even though it didn’t have the services of 6-4 junior Angela Bransom. She had arthroscopic knee surgery Thursday morning and will miss the next month or two of the season.
In spite of Bransom’s absence and six service errors, UW came out and rolled the Cougars to win the first game 15-7.
“They really crammed the middle and that really stalled our offense,” WSU setter Stephanie Papke said. “Cindy told me to move the ball around to the outside and to the high block because the middle was just jammed.”
After taking those instructions, Papke went on to finish the night with a game-high 49 assists.
About a third of the way into the second game, Washington State junior Sarah Silvernail made the court her personal playpen. A 5-3 Cougar deficit quickly turned into a 15-6 win to knot the match at 1-1.
The eighth, 10th and 12th WSU points were all Silvernail kills. After each one of them, Washington coach Bill Neville called time in an attempt to stop the bleeding. Nothing worked.
“They (WSU) have the ability to turn points in a hurry,” Neville said. “They are smart and they just consistently execute.”
Though Silvernail registered a game-high 19 kills, it was one of her five digs that seemed to turn Cougar fortunes.
With WSU holding a 6-5 lead and the Huskies serving, Silvernail got WSU the sideout with a dig that forced her to reach across the right side of her body when her initial momentum had her going to the left.
The night wasn’t all Silvernail’s. WSU middle blocker Jenny Herndon turned in 14 kills, Elis Arias 11 and Keren Oigman and Shannon Wyckoff nine each.
In the fourth game, Washington led 10-4 and appeared ready to take the whole affair to five games, but then the Cougars reeled off 11 straight points for the 15-10 win.
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