Stephen F. Austin
South Dakota
Ladyjacks Win Two At Bulldog Challenge
9/10/2010 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
Sept. 10, 2010
Wisconsin-Green Bay Box Score
South Dakota Box Score
DES MOINES, Iowa - After three losses last weekend the Ladyjack volleyball team put an end to their skid on Friday, winning a pair of matches on the first day of the Bulldog Challenge hosted by Drake University. The Ladyjacks had to play comeback in the first match of the day, knocking off Wisconsin-Green Bay in five before sweeping past South Dakota in the nightcap at the Knapp Center.
SFA 3, Wisconsin-Green Bay 2
The Ladyjacks picked up its third five-set win of the year on Friday morning, but this time pulling it off in comeback fashion by erasing a 2-0 deficit and pulling out a 3-2 (21-25, 21-25, 25-23, 25-20, 15-13) win over Wisconsin-Green Bay in the first match of the Bulldog Challenge.
MC Bottles paced four Ladyjacks in double-figure kills with 17, while Kelsey Owens and Melissa Miksch added double-doubles to lead an SFA attack that hit .194 for the match. Freshman setter Allison Gideon came just one kill shy of a triple-double and senior Laurel Kuepker added a spark offensively as well in her season debut with 11 assists in just three sets of work.
Madison Hanlan led with a match-high 26 digs and Lindsay Hill had a hand in five of SFA's eight blocks.
The Ladyjacks were in danger of dropping their fourth match in a row after digging an 0-2 hole to the Phoenix (2-6), a team led by former Ladyjack setter Whitney Schott who had a match-high 53 assists on the day. Green Bay hit .259 in the first two sets, leading nearly the entirety of the way into the locker room at the break.
Even after the half the outlook was bleak for SFA, falling behind 20-15 on a kill from Carmen Leitterman, and 23-19 when Kelly Mischler's shot found the floor. But Sabrina Burns and Leslie Jackson sparked a six-point rally with a block on the next point. The Phoenix followed that with three more consecutive misfires before a bad set on Schott gave SFA a set-point opportunity. Burns then delivered a kill to clinch the set and keep SFA afloat.
The momentum carried over for SFA into the fourth set with Bottles pacing the attack with four kills with the Phoenix never holding the lead in the frame. The Ladyjacks never led by more than two points until late in the fourth and were able to force Phoenix miscues in two of the final three points to push the match to a deciding set.
Fittingly, the Ladyjacks had to come from behind in the fifth set as well. Green Bay held a slim 10-8 lead just after the set's midpoint on a score by Lindstedt, but after a Phoenix attack error it was consecutive points from Miksch and Owens that regained the lead for SFA. The Ladyjack offense was able to take it nearly the rest of the way as Bottles and Gideon delivered the final two knockout blows to secure the win in SFA's favor.
SFA 3, South Dakota 0
The Ladyjacks held South Dakota to just .092 hitting and got 11 kills from Bottles in a 3-0 (25-19, 25-15, 25-20) win in its first ever meeting with the Coyotes, picking up back-to-back wins for the first time in the young season.
SFA (4-5) got 24 assists from Gideon and three players finished in double-figure digs, led by Madison Hanlan's 15 as the defense kept the Coyotes (2-9) at arm's length all evening.
A wire-to-wire win opened things for the Ladyjacks against the Coyotes with SFA getting a balanced effort offensively out of the gate. Miksch helped SFA get some separation, sandwiching one of her two service aces on the night between a pair of attack errors by USD that gave SFA a 15-12 lead. The junior added another ace and a kill late in the set before Gideon found Bottles for a score and a Coyote attack error gave SFA the six-point win.
The Coyotes could not muster positive hitting in the second set, while the Ladyjacks could only put together a .174 hitting percentage themselves, but it was good enough to pull give SFA the 2-0 advantage. SFA raced out to a 10-5 edge and continued to build the lead before Sabrina Burns closed out the frame with two of the final three points.
Bottles added five of her kills in the final set, but it was not until a quick three-point spurt that gave the Ladyjacks a 15-13 lead that SFA was able to get some breathing room. Miksch and Bottles added kills that pushed the lead to 22-18 before Kelsey Owens closed things out with her fifth kill of the match.
SFA has two more matches remaining in the Bulldog Challenge, beginning with a 2:30 p.m. clash with Idaho State, followed by a 7:30 p.m. match with the undefeated host, Drake.
-SFA-
