UCSD holds a third place conference standing after crushing Chico State and Cal State Stanislaus.
Over this past weekend, the UCSD women’s volleyball team had decisive matches with other good teams to extend its winning streak to four games in a row, after defeating Chico State on Friday night and Cal State Stanislaus on Saturday night at RIMAC Arena in front of ever-faithful fans.
After hitting a rough patch and losing four games, including a three-game losing streak in the middle of the season, the UCSD squad was looking for an opportunity to exert its dominance again and show its true winning nature. After picking up two wins on the road against Cal State Monterey Bay and Cal Poly Pomona two weekends ago, UCSD came into the previous weekend hoping to carry on with the momentum and take down the competition, which it did in a shutout fashion.
GAME ONE
On Friday night, the Tritons won the match with a 3–1 victory, defeating Chico State in four sets. The set scores were 25–12, 25–19, 22–25 and 25–20 in favor of the Tritons. Following this victory, the Tritons improved to a 12–9 overall ranking and 8–5 California Collegiate Athletic Association ranking. Chico State dropped to 16–7 overall and 8–5 CCAA rankings. With this win, UCSD placed into a four–team tie for third place in the CCAA, along with Cal Poly Pomona, Chico State and San Francisco State.
Definitely the most impressive and memorable player of the night was the Tritons’ outside hitter, senior Danielle Dahle. Dahle ended the night with 28 kills, which took her up to a career-high kill count of 1,366 as a Triton. This was highly impressive, as she surpassed Rebecca Bailey, who had held the title for UCSD’s career kill leader with 1,364 kills between 2005 to 2008. The record-breaking kill came off an assist from senior setter Heidi Sierks in the fourth set, putting the Tritons up 15–14. From that point, the Tritons gathered momentum and eventually won the set without too much trouble. Dahle also had an impressive 0.410 hitting percentage with only three errors in 61 attacks. With 11 digs also added to her night, Dahle secured her 10th double-double of the season.
“It’s a crazy feeling. I’m honored … and I’m just happy we’re doing well,” Dahle told the UCSD Athletics Department when asked about surpassing the record of most career kills. “A lot of times we have had trouble closing out games in that third set. I think we did a good job of playing every point like it was just a point, climbing back into it if we were down and not letting it go to our heads. We just kept pushing on and not giving up.”
Junior outside hitter Meagan Wright also put forth an impressive performance as she contributed 17 kills and 24 digs. This allowed her to notch her 13th double-double of the season. Sierks also brought the energy as she hit up 55 assists and 18 digs, which allowed her to notch her a team-high 14th double-double of the season. Sophomore libero Amanda Colla had the squad-high 28 digs for the night.
Comparatively, the Tritons played a better game as they hit 0.274 while the Wildcats hit only 0.158. They also led with a 98–86 advantage in digs and out-blocked the Wildcats 6–2.
GAME TWO
The following Saturday night carried out in a similar fashion. The Tritons held nothing back as they went all in and shut out Cal State Stanislaus 3–0 to maintain their winning streak. The set scores were 25–13, 25–22 and 25–16.
Following this win, the Tritons improved to a 13–9 overall ranking and a 9-5 CCAA ranking. The Warriors fell to 12–8 overall and 6–8 in the CCAA. The Tritons are still tied for third place with Cal Poly Pomona.
The Tritons had their best offensive outing since 2012 on Saturday night as they managed to post up a 0.369 hitting percentage with 45 kills and only seven errors among 103 attacks. The Warriors couldn’t compete with such a strong offense: They only hit a 0.154. The Tritons also out-blocked the Warriors 8–1.
The entire squad played effectively Saturday night, leading to a shutout win. Wright kept the rest of the Tritons to pace with 18.0 points on 13 kills, four service aces and two block assists. Along with 11 digs, Wright obtained her fourth double-double in as many matches while also hitting 0.400.
Dahle continued to build up her living legend status at UCSD as she finished with 12 kills and 11 digs, all while hitting 0.478. This racked up her current leaderboard of kills to a count of 1,378.
Sophomore middle blocker Rebecca Seaberry had five blocks, with one of those being a solo. Colla brought in 10 digs for the Tritons.
“I think it was a good performance by quite a few people… We had a good hitting percentage, our outsides had very few errors and they also had a good hitting percentage. We were very consistent out there,” UCSD Head Coach Ricci Luyties told the UCSD Athletics Department. “If we can just take care of business, we will be in a great spot for our conference.”
With only six games left in the season, the Tritons will look to improve or at least maintain their rankings over the course of these next crucial games. The Tritons will stay home this weekend as they host Cal Poly Pomona on Oct. 30 and Cal State Monterey Bay on Oct. 31.
