Volleyball team up three games

By Evan Glantz

Published Oct. 3, 2008

The Missouri women's volleyball team had an uneven start to the season. A couple wins here, a loss or two there, the team was identified by its inconsistency. It appears they are finally ready to shake that label after running their winning streak up to three games behind outstanding defense.

"Our defense is one of our stronger points on the team just because we get a lot of ball dropping making it possible for our hitters to swing a lot," sophomore defensive specialist Caitlyn Vann said. "It might be frustrating for other teams because it's harder to put a ball down against us."

Missouri's last three opponents know how tough the Tigers' defense can be. The team had consecutive 3-0 victories over conference rival Texas Tech and Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville. Including Wednesday evening, Missouri won eight sets in a row, before Iowa State finally snapped that run. And after winning the third set, the Cyclones decided to make it interesting.

"We knew it was going to be a tough match," freshman defensive specialist Priscilla Armendariz said. "I think after the second game we had a little mental breakdown, like 'We swept them those first two games, we got it.' I think we lost a tiny, little bit of focus, not much. We still knew we had to win big. They were going to come back. They weren't going to just fall down and let us stomp all over them."

The Tigers easily won the first two sets, beating Iowa State 25-15 both times. In the first set, Missouri held its opponent to a .047 hitting percentage. They continued the dominating defense in the second set, as Iowa State could only muster a .185 hitting percentage. But the Tigers got caught on their heels as the Cyclones stormed back to win the next two sets to tie the match.

Nothing was more telling about the first two sets and second two sets as hitting percentage. In games one and two, Missouri held the Cyclones to a combined .100 hitting percentage. However, in the third and fourth games, Iowa State's percentage spiked up to .292. Ultimately, Missouri held on and won the final set 15-7, to win the match 3-2.

"There are a lot of things that all factor in to whether or not you're playing good defense," coach Wayne Kreklow said. "A lot of it starts at the net. And I thought in the first two games and the fifth game, we were doing a much better job of setting our blocks sooner which allows the defenders to get stopped a little bit sooner and positioned better. One of the biggest differences was that our blockers were more disciplined and we got set better and I thought that led to more digs, more transitions and more kills."

The team has taken advantage of Vann's defensive ability. During the three game winning streak, she had 54 digs, including 24 against Iowa State. The team as a whole is averaging 18.6 digs per set.

"(Coach) was talking about how volleyball is a game where it's a bunch of little things put together in one big complex thing," Vann said. "The digs are basically just reading and adjusting around the block. We put up a good block so you just have to read where the hitters are going."