Final Stats | Box Score (PDF) | Hudson Interview | Lucas Interview
BOWLING GREEN, Ky. - No. 25 WKU Volleyball closed the weekend with a sweep of FIU from the E.A. Diddle Arena behind a 14-block effort by the Lady Toppers. Individually, Amara Listenbee tied a career-best seven blocks in the outing.
The victory marks the 350th win in program history inside the E.A. Diddle Arena and the 20th overall win of 2016 for the Red and White (20-2). WKU also improved to 7-0 in Conference USA action with the win while FIU fell to 7-14 on the season and 1-7 in league play.
"20 wins is a mark that is always difficult to get to, especially with the schedule we play," head coach Travis Hudson stated. "To get our 20th in our 22nd match is a pretty special year and I'm really, really proud of them."
Sydney Engle got the Lady Toppers on the board in the opening set with a kill and went on to serve for the next nine points as WKU opened up an early 9-1 advantage. Moving forward, a Taylor Dellinger kill put the Lady Toppers up 18-9 and a Maggie Singleton strike a few points later gave WKU a 24-13 advantage. The hosts claimed the next point to win the opening frame 25-13. WKU held the FIU attack to a -.118 rate while also tallying five team blocks in the set.
Emma Kowalkowski opened action in set two with her 30th service ace of the season and helped the Lady Toppers take a 3-0 lead. The Panthers responded and forced a total of four ties in the frame but couldn't hold on as WKU worked to a 25-17 set-two victory. Sophia Cerino closed the frame with a service ace for her 13th tally of the season. The Lady Toppers saw six different attackers register a kill in the frame for a .208 hitting clip while limiting FIU to a .038 rate.
FIU came out strong in set three and owned as much as a five-point lead over the Lady Toppers. The score was tied just twice in the frame, first at 1-1 and then just before when WKU claimed the lead for good at 11-11. Eventually, Cerino would record her second ace of the afternoon to clinch the match for the Lady Toppers. Alyssa Cavanaugh led the Red and White in the set with eight of the team's 17 kills in the frame. As a squad, WKU produced a .464 offensive showing in the final set in route to a 25-19 match-clinching victory.
"Well, we have a winning culture with this group and program - that's the bottom line," said Hudson of the win. "It certainly hasn't been pretty every night, but we seem to find a way. Today, we were pretty clean, we played well today. You know, FIU has some pretty athletic kids. We are about to hit the stretch that will define if we will win a championship again, but we have certainly put ourselves in the driver's seat."
As a team, WKU produced 14 blocks in the three-set victory over the FIU Panthers. The mark ranks as the most in a three-set Conference USA matchup this season and second across all matches by C-USA teams this season. Listenbee led WKU with seven stops on the day to match her career high while Jessica Lucas matched her own personal best with five blocks. Cavanaugh also contributed five blocks while Rachel Anderson added four of her own.
"With a night that we weren't very good offensively in the first two sets, I looked at the stats and we were only hitting .224 and had 10 blocks," Hudson shared. "That tells you a lot about where we are, we win a lot of different ways. Some nights we are really good offensively, some nights we're really good defensively and today our block was really solid."
Cavanaugh led the Lady Toppers with 13 kills on the day against just four errors for a .375 attack percentage. Anderson added seven kills while Engle chipped in six of her own.
Defensively, Georgia O'Connell led the Red and White in digs with 13 while three more Lady Toppers chipped in six each including: Lucas, Kowalkowski and Engle.
Lucas finished with 31 assists in the match to go along with six digs, five kills, five blocks and a .400 hitting percentage of her own while leading the WKU offense to a .312 hitting clip. The Lady Toppers are now 10-0 when hitting .300 or better with four of those victories coming against a C-USA foe.
After three matches at home, the Lady Toppers are headed for Texas next weekend to take on UTEP Friday night at 7:30 p.m. CT followed by a 12:30 p.m. CT match on Sunday against UTSA.
"Getting through the mid-season lull if you will and picking our energy back up," Hudson said of what he is looking for moving forward from the team. "We are moving toward tournament time and we only have seven games left. We are starting to get a lot of positive momentum with everybody being really confident and being ready once we move towards tournament time."
.png&width=84&height=84&quality=100&type=webp)
