Huskies Once Again Bring Down The House At Cougs’ Expense

University of Washington standout Angela Bransom called it a “tradition.”

Washington State University coach Cindy Fredrick referred to it as a “nightmare.”

They both were speaking of the Huskies’ 17-15, 15-10, 15-8 volleyball victory over the Cougars at Hec Edmundson Pavilion on Friday night in the Pac-10 opener for both schools.

The Cougars, who came in ranked No. 6 in the USA Today/AVCA Top 25 poll, fell to 9-2 overall, 0-1 in the Pac-10. UW, ranked No. 24 is 10-1, 1-0.

What Bransom called the tradition is Washington’s homecourt advantage over Washington State. None of the current Cougars have won a match in Seattle. WSU has not won at the Huskies’ home since Oct. 9, 1992.

“They know it’s really hard to win over here,” said Bransom, who earned Pac-10 and AVCA player of the week this week.

Her Cougar counterpart, Sarah Silvernail, doesn’t give the building as much credit.

“We can’t use that excuse,” said Silvernail. “If we’re a strong enough team we should still win here.”

The Cougars’ downfall came in their offense. WSU made 10 or more attack errors in each game. Outside hitter Shannon Wyckoff and Jennifer Canevari combined for 18 attack errors.

“Our hitters weren’t getting the job done,” Fredrick said. “they weren’t hitting the ball with any kind of aggressiveness. There was no authority at all.”

Adding to the Cougars’ problems were seven receiving errors and nine service errors. “Errors absolutely blew us out of the water,” Fredrick said. “Anytime we got close we’d make a hitting error or passing error.”

Two of the errors came with Washington State trailing 14-10 in the second game. Both miscues came on Cougar serves. On the other side of the net, Washington committed just 19 errors, including only four in the third game. Washington also stuffed the Cougars at the net with a 17-7 block advantage.

“They just blocked the snot out of us,” Fredrick said.

Branson topped the Huskies with 16 kills, five in the third game. Michelle Patton had 50 assists for UW.

Silvernail topped the Cougars with 20 kills.

“We were loading up (blockers) on her and she still got them through,” Washington coach Bill Neville said of Silvernail.

Canevari added 14 kills and Wyckoff and Stephanie Papke had 10 each. Papke had 49 assists and 12 digs.

It doesn’t get any easier for WSU. Next weekend, the Cougars play at No. 2 Stanford on Friday and Cal on Saturday.

The Community Colleges of Spokane finished the first day of competition at its Inland NW Communications Tournament with a 3-1 record to improve to 5-1 on the season. The wins moved CCS coach Irene Matlock three matches away from her 400th career win.

The Sasquatch, playing pool-play matches at Spokane Falls, defeated Treasure Valley 15-10, 15-5, Columbia Basin 15-4, 15-7 and Everett 15-2, 15-11. CCS lost to Ricks College 15-7, 15-6.

Fourteen teams representing the NWAACC and NJCAA are competing in the two-day tournament. The top three finishers in the two pools advance to the single-elimination championship round today at CCS.

, DataTimes