BOULDER, Colo. – The Wildcats Sunday recorded their best hitting (.213) and reception (.972) percentages of the young season against a very good Colorado club; however, a small difference between each side's attack and serving errors accounted for enough cushion in the Buffaloes' 3-0 victory in front of 704 fans at the Coors Events Center.
Colorado won by scores of 25-19, 25-20, 25-20, and is now 6-0 after sweeping the competition (Wake Forest, Rice) at its Omni Invitational, while the Wildcats fell to 1-5. ACU now makes its way to a plane bound for Lubbock, where Monday they'll take on Texas Tech for a 6 p.m. match slated to air on FSSW Plus.
"The team played well and competed hard al weekend," said head coach
Angela Mooney, "and for that I'm very proud of them. We were able to use a few different lineups, which gave a few more players in-game experience, which I believe will help us moving forward with our season ... It also was great to see some individuals produce some really good numbers against quality teams. Overall, it was a great weekend in terms of growth for this program."
ACU collected 42 kills this afternoon on 122 attempts, marking the first time this season the Wildcats hit above .200. But for as solid as that effort was, it wasn't enough to keep pace with a Buffalo offense that hammered home 48 kills on 130 tries and 11 errors (.285).
Colorado hit .282 in the first game, which it led from wire-to-wire. And in game two, the Buffs jumped out to a handful of seven-point leads thanks to a .357 attack percentage (18-42 with 3 errors).
ACU twice would close its deficit to three points late in game two, but couldn't get closer after narrowing the Buffs' lead to 23-20 following an attack error by Lauren Dorrell (8K, .318). Colorado would quickly moved past the miscue, receiving consecutive kills from Naghede Abu (8K, .615) and Dorrell.
The Wildcats and Buffaloes exchanged points through the first 10 possessions of game three, but soon after Colorado took off on a sustained run to build a 16-10 lead. And in the latter stages, the Buffs led by as many as seven points at 23-16.
ACU made one final charge to cut the home team's lead to 23-19 behind three consecutive points from freshman outside hitter
Katelyn Mueller (kill), junior middle blocker
Lauren Walker (kill) and
Makenzie Kesler (block assist with Walker). But a kill from Stephanie Shadley (11K, .281) brought the Buffs to match point and setter Brynna DeLuzio sent the crowd home happy two plays later with one of her three kills.
Junior outside hitter
Jacey Smith led the Wildcats in scoring today with 13.0 points and was ACU's lone representative to the Omni Invitational All-Tournament Team. Smith averaged 3.82 kills per set (42K in 11 sets) this weekend (.167) with one ace and one block.
Sophomore outside hitter
Marybeth Sandercox scored the second most points for ACU in Colorado with 31.0, while defensively, the Wildcats had four players (Walker,
Lorin McNeil,
Kendall Bosse) average at least one block per set or better.
The Wildcats tallied 25.5 blocks for the weekend and averaged 16.6 digs led by sophomore libero
Amanda Chapa, who dug out 6.18 attacks per set. Chapa against Wake Forest Friday set a career high with 28 digs in the four-set loss. She had 18 today vs. Colorado and 22 yesterday vs. Rice.
