The Observer, September 29, 2006
Volume XXXIX, Issue 5
Strong Saturday gives volleyball team confidence boost for UAA's
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The Case Volleyball team had another strong showing last weekend at the Waynesburg College Tournament. The team faced its two strongest competitors in the tournament on the first night and lost both matches. The Spartans went to five games in their first match against West Virginia Wesleyan, and after winning the first two games, dropped the last three to lose a tough match (30-17, 30-25, 23-30, 26-30, 12-15).
Nonetheless, the Spartans played well against a tough Bobcat volleyball team.
"I was very pleased with our performance against West Virginia," said Coach Karen Farrell.
In the second match against Mount Union, the team went down in three consecutive games, though the women demonstrated improvement as the match progressed (30-16, 30-13, 32-30).
On Saturday, the team rebounded from those two losses the previous night as the Spartans beat both Waynesburg College 3-2 (30-24, 18-30, 19-30, 30-24, 15-12) and Franciscan University 3-0 (30-14, 30-21, 30-26).
"We had a few tough losses on day one, but played well on the second day to come out of the weekend with a good 2-2 record," said co-captain Julianna Burrows.
Colleen Martin and SK Piper were the stars of the weekend. Martin, in perhaps her strongest performance of the year thus far, led the team in kills in two of the four matches, including 24 in the first against West Virginia Wesleyan. Piper had an outstanding performance for the second weekend in a row, including tournament highs of 24 kills and 24 digs in the third match against Waynesburg.
"This team is filled with talented individuals such as Colleen and Piper and every week, as they play more matches, they gain confidence and are able to perform well," Farrell said.
The team plays in the first UAA round robin of the season this coming weekend at Emory University. Two of their matches are against highly ranked opponents Washington University (ranked second) and New York University, which is ranked No. 14 in the country. Both teams will pose tough challenges to the Case team.
"We need to practice as if we are playing the matches and remain competitive," Burrows said when asked what the team must do in order to win.
"We also need to push ourselves if we want to compete on that level," added co-captain Ashley Garman.
The team leaves for Emory on Friday morning and will be facing a very tough and highly ranked Washington (Mo.) squad in their first match.
"We've been improving statistically each week and have shown a lot of development in practice," Garman said. "We're excited and ready for the round robin tournament and looking to do well."
The second match is against the University of Chicago, whom the Spartans beat last year in five sets. They then conclude the tournament with their match against NYU.
