ACU rolls past Central Oklahoma
11/18/2005 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
Wildcats roll past Lady Bronchos
ACU moves into regional semifinals with 3-0 victory
KEARNEY, Neb. -- The ACU Wildcats continued their history-making season Friday afternoon as the nationally ranked Wildcats rolled past Central Oklahoma in three games to win the first NCAA post-season match in program history.
The Wildcats' 3-0 win over the Lady Bronchos in the NCAA Division II Southwest Region Tournament quarterfinals propels the 30-3 Wildcats into Saturday evening's regional semifinals. ACU is ranked No. 11 in the nation and has now won a school-record 30 straight matches. ACU will play either No. 2 seed Metro State or No. 7 seed West Texas A&M at 5 p.m. Saturday at the Health and Sports Center on the campus of the University of Nebraska-Kearney.
ACU has played both teams already this season and is 2-1 in those three matches. The Wildcats have beaten WTAM twice and lost to Metropolitan State, 3-2, on Aug. 27 in Tampa, Fla. That loss to Metro State marks the last time the Wildcats have been beaten this season.
Friday's match wasn't quite a carbon copy of last Saturday's dominating ACU win over UCO in the Lone Star Conference Post-Season Tournament championship match, but it was close. The Wildcats rallied from a 22-17 deficit to win the first game, 30-26, and then ran through the Lady Bronchos, 30-18, in the second game. ACU led from the outset in the third game, although UCO closed to within 24-23 before ACU ran off the last six points of the game to win the match.
ACU's effort Friday was much better than in a 3-0 loss to St. Edward's in the quarterfinals of last year's regional tournament, which marked the program's first NCAA post-season appearance. ACU out-dug the Lady Bronchos, 73-61, out-blocked them, 8-3, and had a .302 hitting percentage compared to UCO's .052 percentage.
ACU senior outside hitter Michelle Bernhardt led the Wildcats with 16 kills, while sophomore outside hitter Abbie Lowry had 15 kills and senior middle blocker Amanda Slate added 12. Sophomore libero Liz Snoddy played the best match of her career with 22 digs to show for her stellar defense from the back row. The Wildcats'
passing and serve-receive game was much better Friday than it was in last year's loss to St. Edward's.
"We were a lot more relaxed this year, and it starts with me," ACU head coach Brek Horn said. "I think we were all a little bit overwhelmed with the whole scene last year. But we've had a year to mature, and that paid off for us.
"We knew that we would have to play much better defensively and that our serve-receive would have to be much better today, and it was," said Horn, who improved to 172-67 as the Wildcats' head coach. "There were only a couple of times in the match that we got tight, but we fought through those spots."
The first time came in the third game when the Lady Bronchos rallied from an 11-7 deficit to take as much as a 22-17 lead over the Wildcats. ACU watched a couple of close go against it in the run, and had trouble passing as the Lady Bronchos appeared ready to seize early control of the match.
But Horn called timeout with her team trailing 22-17, and whatever she said most definitely worked because the Wildcats ripped off of the last 17 points to win the first game. ACU scored five straight points out of the timeout to tie it at 22-22, and then after the match was tied again at 23-23 the Wildcats scored four straight points to take control. UCO's Katie Schult -- who hit -.048 in the match -- had an attack error on game point to give the first game to the Wildcats.
The Wildcats never trailed in the second game, rolling to an early 10-3 advantage before UCO head coach Jeff Boyland called timeout. After getting back to within 13-11, senior Ashlee Motola -- who recorded three kills to give her 1,001 career kills -- put one down, followed by three straight from Bernhardt and an attack error on UCO to give ACU an 18-11 lead.
ACU's lead never got below four points the rest of the way, and Lowry finished the second game off with a kill to give the Wildcats a 2-0 lead.
The Wildcats again jumped out to a big advantage in the third game, taking as much as a 16-6 lead on back-to-back kills by Lowry. But UCO would not quietly as the Lady Bronchos outscored ACU 17-6 to creep to within 24-23 on a service ace by Penny Wascovich. But Schult was blocked by Slate and Lindsey Martin on a kill attempt to push ACU's advantage back to 25-23, and the Wildcats rolled from there. ACU, in fact, scored the game's final six points to get the win.
Horn called timeout with her team leading 22-19, and ACU outscored the Lady Bronchos 8-4 after the timeout to win the game and the match.
"She just told us that our defense had to get back to the level it was at earlier in the match." Snoddy said. "They were beating us defensively, and that's how they got back in the match. We finished the match by getting our defense back together and doing what we needed to do on that side of the net."
Freshman middle blocker Lauren Leone had a big match for the Wildcats with five total blocks (two solo) and one kill, while Martin finished with 41 assists to give her 5,704 for her career, good for 19th all-time in NCAA Division II volleyball history. Bernhardt's 16 kills give her 2,099 for her career, which is 18th all-time in NCAA Division II volleyball history.
Motola helped ACU make some history Friday as well as the Wildcats are believed to be the first team in NCAA Division II volleyball history to have four players who have played their entire careers together (Bernhart, Martin, Motola and Slate) and have one player record 5,000 career assists, another player record 2,000 career kills, another player record 1,500 career kills, and another player record 1,000 career kills.
