Nov. 8, 2013
Final Stats
LONG BEACH, Calif. - Despite a career-high 20 kills by junior Mary Schroeder and a .464 hitting average from middle blocker Victoria Lee, UC Davis fell to Long Beach State by scores of 27-25, 25-23, 19-25 and 25-23 in Big West Conference women's volleyball action in front of 997 fans at Walter Pyramid Friday evening.
The Aggies slip to 14-10 for the year and 6-5 in conference matches. The 49ers improve to 13-10 overall and 6-4 in Big West play.
Schroeder committed only five hitting errors on a team-leading 45 swings for a .333 hitting average. Lee, already the conference leader in attack efficiency, put down 14 kills against just one error on 28 attempts. Senior Devon Damelio and junior Valerie Brain also hit double figures with 15 and 11 kills, respectively. Senior setter Jenny Woolway posted 52 assists with 12 digs. She trailed only junior libero Megan Lancaster's 14 digs among the UC Davis floor defenders.
For the Beach, senior outside hitter Delainey Aigner-Swesey notched 17 kills, 10 in her team's first-set win. Bre Mackie added 14 kills with a .407 success rate while Alex Reid provided a double-double of 13 kills and 12 digs. Aigner-Swesey was also among three 49ers with five blocks; LBSU had 11 team stuffs to its guest's five.
UC Davis held late leads in each of the first and second sets before eventually falling by the minimum two-point margin in each. Aigner-Swesey finished with a 10-0-16 attacking chart in the opener to counter the 11 scored between Damelio and Schroeder. The Aggies held set points of 24-23 and 25-24 before Chisom Okpala scored a kill and a block assist in a 3-0 finish to help LBSU snipe a 1-0 match lead.
The Aggies ran out to a 10-7 lead in a second set that saw 17 ties and eight lead changes. Schroeder had six kills in the frame, including one that gave UC Davis a late 20-19 lead. Brain added another five, the last of which set the board at 21-20 in the Aggies' favor. LBSU suffered from four of its 12 total service errors in the set, the fourth giving UC Davis a 23-22 advantage. Again, the 49ers scored three straight to close out the stanza, getting kills from Okpala and Erin Juley to take their first lead in a 10-point span. The Beach hit 18-1-43 for a .385 average in that second set, holding a 2-0 lead into the break.
The 49er offense cooled to just eight kills in the third as UC Davis rode a 8-3 start to its first set win. Lee scored three kills in that opening stretch while one of six hitting errors later boosted the Aggies to a 15-10 advantage. Long Beach State eventually closed the gap to a 19-18 deficit but never equalized. Damelio, Schroeder and Lee combined for four kills in a 6-1 Aggie run to close out the set.
Long Beach State pulled away from a 10-9 battle midway through the fourth set thanks to six kills each from Okpala and Reid, and held at least a two-point edge until Lee's back-to-back kills cut the margin to just 22-21. Okpala answered with consecutive kills to set the 49ers to a 24-21 match point before UC Davis fought back to a 24-23 deficit. LBSU called a timeout, the responded with Reid's side-out kill for the winner.
Schroeder's previous offensive bests had been 17 kills, scored in recent home wins against then-No. 8 Hawai'i and Cal State Fullerton. Woolway's 52 assists rates as her highest total for a four-set match since delivering 62 against LSU in the opening weekend. She now needs just 205 more to break into the Big West Conference's all-time career top 10.
The Aggies continue league action at UC Irvine on Saturday. Match time at the Bren Center is 7 p.m.
