Photo by Shawn Jones
The women’s volleyball team hosted this weekend’s Pepperdine Invitational, where they defeated the University of California Santa Barbara and the University of Virginia but fell to Colorado State.
The Waves kicked off the weekend with a win over the UCSB Gauchos on Friday.
The Waves trailed the Gauchos for much of the first set but fought their way back to tie the score at 22. A kill and a pair of aces from UCSB ended the first set at 22-25.
Pepperdine retaliated with a three-set sweep, beating the Gauchos 25-14, 25-20 and 25-15.
Junior Katie Messing led the team in kills with a career high of 18, followed by sophomore Taylor Racich with 13. Freshman Brooke Honeycutt had six blocks, and junior Samantha Cash had five. Sophomore Becca Strehlow contributed 50 set assists, while senior Kelley Larsen had 18 digs.
Their success continued Saturday with a four-set victory over the Virginia Cavaliers.
The Waves took the lead early on, finishing sets one and two 25-21 and 25-22 respectively.
The Cavaliers refused to go down without a fight. After 14 tie scores in the third set, Virginia came out on top 23-25.
In set four, the Waves struggled once again to gain a significant lead. At 19-16 they were able to spark a run to win the set 25-17.
Messing led the Waves with 17 kills, Larsen had 16, Strehlow added 45 set assists and five blocks and Cash tied her career high of six blocks.
CSU presented the Waves with their biggest challenge of the weekend on Saturday.
A combination of CSU’s strong offense and holes in Pepperdine’s defense put the Waves at a disadvantage in sets one and two. They lost both sets 20-25.
“Our passing was not consistent, which affected all other aspects of our game,” Larsen said.
Even in light of obstacles, the Waves were not about to quit. “We came together as a team and decided we needed to up our energy level and play more aggressively as a team,” said Larson.
The Waves battled through the third set, tying up the score 11 times. At 19-19, multiple kills from Racich and Larsen gave the Waves the momentum they needed. The swing was topped off by a kill from Messing to beat the Rams 25-23.
With their hope of winning revived, the Waves readjusted their game for set four.
However, the Rams were not willing to drop another set. With the score tied, back-to-back kills from Colorado’s junior Marlee Reynolds ended the set 23-25.
“It was a battle, but we learned a lot in that match,” Larsen said. “[That] will help us in our future matches.”
Larsen had a team-high of 15 kills, followed by Racich with 14. Cash provided five blocks, and Racich and Chandler each had three service aces. Strehlow added 42 set assists.
“I think we are learning every match, and I thought it was a great tournament,” Head Coach Nina Matthies said. “We had really good teams here.”
The Waves are 4-2 overall.
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As published in the Sept. 12 issue of the Pepperdine Graphic.
