Tiger volleyball sweeps Buffaloes, 3-0

The team improved to 3-3 in conference play and will continue the season against Nebraska Wednesday.

By Zach Dischiano

Published Oct. 5, 2010

The Missouri volleyball team improved to 11-5 overall and 3-3 in conference play with its 3-0 sweep of the Colorado Buffaloes on Saturday night.

Senior outside hitter Paola Ampudia recorded her best performance of the year, posting a season-high 20 kills on .293 hitting. Freshman setter Molly Kreklow anchored the offense with 44 assists and was one dig shy of a double-double. Kreklow’s fellow freshman outside hitter Lisa Henning also played well with nine kills on the night.

The game started out fairly close, with no team extending its lead past three points until Ampudia’s kill, which put the Tigers up 20-16. An ace from senior libero Caitlyn Vann forced a Colorado timeout, who later came out of the break and answer with three straight points. Senior outside hitter Julianna Klein responded with a kill of her own, and the team closed out the set with three out of the next five points. The final score of set one was 25-20.

“I thought we played really well,” Henning said. “I that thought our serving and passing was really good. Our serves were so aggressive and our passing was always on target.”

The Tigers got off to a slow start in the second set with five of the first six points scored by the Buffaloes. After the early burst of offense from Colorado, Ampudia got into a rhythm which no player on the opposite side could stop. The score was tied at 10 before Ampudia heated up, scoring five out of the next six points, four of which were kills and the other a block.

Ampudia’s string of scoring gave the Tigers a 16-11 advantage, but the Buffaloes wouldn’t go down easy. Colorado scored four straight points and tied the set at 16. Kills from Henning and Ampudia kept the Tigers alive, and the set continued to go back and forth with the score tied at 22. Missouri again turned to Ampudia, who scored two out of the next three points to win the set. The senior’s 11 kills in the second set were the core of her 20 total kills on the night, a 2010 Big 12 record in a three-set match.

“I felt very comfortable today,” Ampudia said. “I felt like we played a lot better and helped each other out more. I felt very good; it was my best match so far.”

The Tigers hoped to put away the Buffaloes early in the third set to avoid giving Colorado a chance to come back and win. With the score tied at six, junior defensive specialist Priscilla Armendariz served two consecutive aces, which started a five-to-one run and put the Buffaloes in a four-point deficit. Colorado never found a way to bounce back, and Missouri never gave up the lead after the previous scoring run. Ampudia tallied her 20th kill on the final point of the set, which ended the match, 25-19.

“There’s a lot of things we could do a lot better, so I wouldn’t classify it as a great performance by any means, but we did a lot of things well,” coach Wayne Kreklow said. “I thought we were pretty steady tonight.”

The Tigers look to add another win to the Big 12 record Wednesday, Oct. 6, when they host the No. 3 Nebraska Cornhuskers. The match starts at 6:30 p.m. at the Hearnes Center.