HIGH POINT, N.C. ? For the first time since 2000, Austin Peay State University's volleyball team has won its season's first two matches, posting a 3-1 (19-30, 31-29, 30-27, 30-23) victory, Friday, against co-host High Point in the UNC-Greensboro/High Point University Triad Challenge. The Lady Govs swept Kennesaw State, 3-0, earlier Friday.
The match wasn't an offensive masterpiece for the Lady Govs as they were out hit in the match both in kills, 62-58, and attack percentage, .171 to .131. However, it was the service game that proved the Panthers undoing as they committed 16 service errors in the match and permitted the Lady Govs to post eight service aces.
“We served tough at crucial points during the match,” said Lady Govs head coach Jenny Hazelwood. “We were able to get them out of their rhythm when we needed it in the match and it again paid off big. This was an emotional, tough, hard-fought match tonight and I was impressed with the way we performed.”
In the match's first game, Austin Peay (2-0) got off to a sluggish start offensively with recording 14 kills and 10 attack errors. Meanwhile, High Point's offense was firing away early with 16 kills and only two attack errors on the way to a 30-19 victory.
The momentum slowly turned in game two, as the two teams battled to 20 ties and eight lead changes. The game ultimately went into extra points where HPU faltered, committing back-to-back attack errors to hand APSU the game, 31-29.
“Our middle hitters are young and they struggled early offensively,” said Hazelwood. “We switched some things around in the middle and that opened up the offense. Dodi (Szymska) took advantage of the change we made and picked up her attack in the last three games which helped our middle hitters out even more."
The third game was another battle with 11 ties and four lead changes. The Lady Govs took control of the match after a well-timed timeout with High Point leading 17-14. Austin Peay returned to the court and put together an 8-2 run to take a 22-19 lead and would not look back on the way to a 30-27 victory.
Game four was tight early until the Lady Govs scored used an 11-2 run to take a 26-17 lead which they would not relinquish on the way to a match-clinching 30-23 victory.
Szymska led all hitters with 20 kills while posting a .220 attack percentage. Sophomore Kirstin Distler added 14 kills as APSU needed just 58 kills to win the match. The Lady Govs defense had an impressive night also, recording 110 digs in the match, senior Kristen Kirch leading the way with 28 digs while Distler chipped in 24 and senior Caroline Frens added 21 digs.
High Point had four players reach double-digit kill territory, Jamie Kaufman leading the way with 17 kills. The Panthers defense held its own with 97 digs and won the front-row defensive battle with a 9-7 edge in blocks. Audie Gonzalez led the back-row effort with 23 digs while Anna Lott led the net defense with five blocks.
Austin Peay will travel to Greensboro for a pair of matches, Saturday. First up is a 12:30 p.m. (CDT) contest against UNC-Greensboro, the tournament's other host, which stands 2-0 after the tournament's first day. The Lady Govs will then meet Radford (0-2) in a 3 p.m. affair.
“We have to get some rest tonight after this hard-fought match,” said Hazelwood. “Then we have to show up at the gym tomorrow ready to play. We're going to go in with the same game plan with our serving and then work on getting our offense going.”
- AP -
