By Ron Smith
November 3, 2017
 
(SANTA BARBARA, Calif.) Cassidy Rea tallied 10 kills while Emma Harrah, Libby Dahlberg, Taylor Beckman and Samantha Neely each had seven in #6 Westmont Volleyball's 3-0 (25-21, 25-17, 25-15) Golden State Athletic Conference win over William Jessup (18-15, 3-10 GSAC). It was the Warriors 29th consecutive GSAC victory.
 
Before the match, Westmont (29-3, 13-0) took time to honor four seniors – Taylor Beckman, Emma Harrah, Mila Maricic and Lindsay Paulo.
 
"Our seniors are special to us and special to this team," said Westmont head coach Patti Cook. "They have done a great job of leading in their different ways on and off the court. We are incredibly grateful for all the contributions they've made to this program. It was nice to get to honor them tonight and see them play hard on their home court."
 
The match started slowly for the Warriors who found themselves down 21-20 in the opening frame. Harrah delivered a kill from the middle of the net that earned the Warriors a side out. Harrah rotated into the serving position bringing Libby Dahlberg back into the front row.
 
A kill by Dahlberg gave the Warriors the lead before Harrah served up an ace to make the score 23-21. Right side hitter Cassidy Rea then put the first set to bed with back-to-back kills.
 
"We haven't played well in front of big home crowds," acknowledged Cook. "I told the team we need to play for God and play for each other and not worry about playing to please the crowd. I felt that we started to get into rhythm a little bit more after that.
 
"William Jessup had a different pace of game. Their sets were a little bit higher and so our timing was a little bit off. Our hitters came in swinging low, so we talked about going for high hands. Once they made those adjustment, we started to get some stuff blocks and some good swings."
 
The second set started in similar fashion to the first, but then swung in Westmont's favor. Trailing 5-4, the Warriors benefited from three successive attack errors by the Jessup hitters before Beckman delivered a kill to give Westmont an 8-4 lead. It proved to be a lead the Warriors would not surrender.
 
In the third set, Westmont led 16-13 before closing out the set and match with a 9-2 run. Harrah contributed three kills during the run while Rea and Dahlberg each added one. Rea teamed up first with Harrah and then with Dahlberg to score points on blocks.
 
"Libby definitely stood out to me," said Cook. "She was finding a lot of success with her swings and attacks."
 
Dahlberg produced a .600 attack percentage, recording seven kills on 10 attempts.
 
"We knew we wanted to go after their smaller block when their setter was in the front row," added Cook. "Emma did a nice job of creating opportunities to exploit that smaller block.
 
"Cassidy really caught fire, once she found her rhythm. After putting a few balls out, she made a nice adjustment of coming in a lot stronger on her approach.
 
"Sam had a different pace in her approach at first. Once she started attacking with a lot more aggression, she found good success.
 
"Defensively, we made some really good moves. We ran the team quite a bit this week for letting balls drop in practice. Tonight, I saw bodies going after balls. That was a good confirmation of what we have been working on. It was good to see Lindsay out there getting a bunch of digs and moving around the court well. She also set a really nice second ball.
 
"Camryn Kaina played a really good defensive game. She was looking to explode forward on the balls of her feet. Not a lot went to the angle that she didn't pick up."
 
Kaina also tallied 20 assists in the Warriors' victory.
 
Westmont will conclude the regular season play tomorrow when they host Menlo (21-8, 8-5) in Murchison Gymnasium beginning at noon