Box Score
By
Ron Smith
Westmont Women's Volleyball (5-0) continued its on court dominance with a sweep of #18 Southern Oregon (3-4) on Wednesday afternoon. The number 18 Warriors defeated the Raiders 25-18, 25-20, 25-14 to remain undefeated.
"We were very much in control of the match," said Westmont head coach Patti Cook, whose team produced an attack percentage of .289 while holding its opponent to .029. "We did not let them get the momentum."
The Warriors' early season success is made all the more remarkable by the absence of one-third of the roster due to injury. Westmont is currently missing five members of the 15-player squad.
"We beat them with our serving and passing game," said Cook. "Our setters (Alexa Nestlerode and Amy Buffham), did a nice job of distributing the passes across the net to all of our hitters. A lot of that was due to (libero) Kami (Troesh) who showed passing consistency throughout the match."
Nestlerode tallied 22 assists in the match while Buffham added another 15. Troesh handled 15 serve receptions without an error and contributed 12 digs.
Offensively, Libby Dahlberg led the way with 10 kills and a .500 attack percentage. Taylor Beckman added another nine kills while recording 24 service receptions and eight digs.
The Warriors frustrated the Raiders offensive efforts with 13 team blocks. Mila Maricic had eight total blocks, Sam Neely added six, and Dahlberg and Jessica McCann each contributed five.
With the scored tied at nine in the first set, Westmont produced a 6-1 run to go ahead 15-10. The run was constructed with two kills each by Dahlberg and Beckman, a kill by Cassidy Rea, a service ace by Nestlerode and a solo block by Dahlberg. Southern Oregon would get no closer than three points the rest of the set.
In the second set, the Warriors pulled away with a 5-0 run to make the score 13-6. Maricic and McCann were credited with a pair of blocks during the run while Maricic and Neely each added kills.
The third set saw the Warriors take control from the start by jumping out to an 11-2 lead.
"We are very much enjoying the start to the season," said Cook about her team's five wins, three over ranked opponents, "and we are looking forward to our next match. The next match is always the most important match."
The Warriors won't have to wait long. On Friday, the Warriors will travel to Santa Clarita for games against Oregon Tech (0-0) and Life Pacific (0-1).
