ABILENE - Abilene Christian volleyball remains the only Southland Conference school with an undefeated home record after the Wildcats held on to beat Sam Houston State, 3-2, Saturday afternoon at Moody Coliseum.
ACU (7-17) won by scores of 16-25, 25-20, 25-21, 15-25 and 15-12 in improving to 5-0 at home and 6-3 vs. the Southland Conference, while the Bearkats (9-11) slipped to 3-4 against the league.
Sam Houston topped the Wildcats in every statistical category from attacking percentage (.281 to .207) to digs (82-79) to blocks (10-8), but the home team succesfully battled back when it needed to most starting with the end of game two. The Wildcats were already down a set and trailed 19-17 when a little bit of 'Moody Magic' kicked in to help ACU take off on a game-ending 8-1 run.
The Wildcats got within a point on a Bearkat attacking error, and then scored five straight points with sophomore
Mikai Brown on the serve – a run that included three kills from sophomore
Jacey Smith.
Lexi Mercier brought the Wildcats to match point with one of her 12 kills (24-20) and Smith finished the set with one of the team's seven service aces.
ACU again had to dig into its bag of tricks to win game three after trailing by as many as three points. This time the Wildcats posted a 5-0 run to flip a 14-15 deficit into a 19-15 lead, and after the Bearkats crawled to within two points at 20-18, the home team received three consecutive points from
Lauren Walker, Smith and
Dorothy Swanson, whose ace made it a 23-18 game.
Walker's fourth kill of the set moved the score to 24-20, and Bosse then served up one of her 46 assists to
Marybeth Sandercox on the final possession.
Sam Houston responded to being down a game with a new lineup in game four, and it worked close to perfection as the Bearkats' two-setter system of Michelle Griffith and Jaclyn Ward helped the visitors post their highest attacking percentage of the match at .372. Their defense also stepped up in digging out 20 attacks as the Wildcats hit just .195.
Game five was tense from wire-to-wire and featured five tie scores and two lead changes, the last of which took place when the Wildcats' 3-0 run following the court switch gave them a 10-8 lead. From there ACU twice would push its lead out to three points, first on an ace by Walker that made it 12-9, and then on a kill from Smith that made it 13-10.
Sam Houston though continued to be resilient and got to within 13-12 after consecutive kills by Amanda Gooch and Sarah Sherman. But on the very next possession Bosse and Mercier combined for one of the team's eight blocks, and then senior
Dorothy Swanson was credited with the match winner thanks to her seventh kill of the afternoon.
Smith again led the Wildcats with 19.5 points on 18 kills (.275), an ace and block assist, while the middle blockers Mercier and Walker accounted for 32 points. Walker led all players with four aces to go with her 2.5 blocks and 11 kills (.360), and Mercier finished with 14.5 points.
In addition to setting the offense, Bosse delivered eight kills on 16 attempts with no errors and dug out 15 attacks, which were second on the team to freshman libero
Amanda Chapa (21).
Five Bearkats reached double figures in points led by Brooke White, who had 20 kills on 47 attempts and three blocks.
The Wildcats return to action Tuesday, Oct. 18 with a 7 p.m. match at Lamar.
