RIVERSIDE, Calif. — UC Davis freshman
Amara Aimufua finished with a career-high 19 kills and hit .643 on the night, committing only one error in 28 swings, while the Aggies collectively hit .398 as a team en route to a 3-0 (25-21, 25-16, 25-15) sweep of host UC Riverside in the Big West Conference opener for both teams on Tuesday night at the SRC Arena in Riverside, Calif.
The Aggies improved to 5-7 overall and 1-0 in league play with the win, taking home a victory in their Big West opener for the second straight year and winning their fourth consecutive conference match dating back to a three-match winning streak at the end of the 2019 campaign.
Aimufua logged her third-straight double-digit kill performance and her seventh overall this season on Tuesday night as her 19 kills surpassed her previous single-match best of 15 set against nationally ranked UCLA on Aug. 29 and tied against Santa Clara on Sept. 4.
The .643 hitting percentage is the best by an Aggie this season and the highest for a UC Davis player with a minimum of 12 kills since
Alexa Rockas hit .650 (13-0-20) against CSUN on Oct. 13, 2019. Meanwhile, the team's .398 hitting percentage was a season high and the best since the Aggies hit .422 collectively against the Matadors in that same contest.
Junior
Josephine Ough added six kills, three blocks, and hit .500 on the night, while sophomore
Perri Starkey added five moore kills and five blocks in the win. Freshman
Casi Newman served up a career-high 32 assists and added eight digs and a pair of aces.
Defensively, UC Davis collected 13 blocks and limited UC Riverside to just .063 hitting on the night as the Highlanders committed 22 errors to just six for the Aggies.
UC Davis wraps up the opening weekend of Big West play at home on Saturday (Sept. 25) at 7 p.m., welcoming perennial power Hawai'i to the University Credit Union Center.
FIRST SET
UC Riverside came out of the gates firing, jumping out to an 8-3 lead early and forcing UC Davis to take a quick timeout just 11 points into the set. The lead remained five until three straight plays at net inched the Aggies closer as a solo block by
Perri Starkey and back-to-back stuffs by Starkey and
Alexa Hogan made it a two-point set.
After trading service errors, another 3-0 run thanks to a pair of errors sandwiched around a kill by
Josephine Ough tied the match at 11-11, but the Highlanders tallied four of the next five points to regain control of the set.
A kill by Aimufua and an ace from
Casi Newman later in the set tied things back up a 16 apiece, forcing a UCR timeout. The two teams traded kills out of the break, but back-to-back kills from Hogan and
Lana Radakovic, along with an error by the Highlanders, turned the tide, giving the Aggies the lead, forcing the Highlanders to take their second timeout of the set.
A kill by Starkey out of the second break made it 21-17 and UC Davis scored three of the final four points in the period to take the first, 25-21.
SECOND SET
Riverside again got off to a hot start, scoring five of the first seven points to grab the early advantage, but the Aggies answered with seven of the next eight, with three kills by Aimufua during that stretch to grab a lead they would not relinquish.
UC Davis exploded again later in the set, scoring six straight points to turn a 15-13 lead into an eight-point lead — four of those off the hands of Aimufua — and the Aggies closed out a 25-16 win in the second with the help of three Highlander errors and a kill by Starkey to take a 2-0 lead in the match.
THIRD SET
This time it was UC Davis that grabbed the early lead, using an error and a Starkey kill to spark a run that saw the Aggies score six of the first eight points in the set. Riverside clawed back with a pair of points, but a two-point deficit quickly ballooned into a seven-point UC Davis advantage thanks to a 5-0 run.
The Highlanders would hang close, eventually cutting the gap to 15-11 midway through the set, but a 7-0 Aggie run put Riverside's collective backs against the wall. The Highlanders answered that punch by scoring four of the next five, but a kill by
Tory Holmes and a block by Aimufua and
Maddie Gleason finished off a 25-15 win and a sweep for UC Davis.
ABOUT UC DAVIS
Centrally located between San Francisco and Lake Tahoe, over 700 student-athletes across 25 teams enjoy an unrivaled undergraduate experience at the fifth-ranked public school in the country.
Ranked annually in the nation's top 10 in diversity and students' social mobility, UC Davis and its innovative Aggie EVO System helps student-athletes develop passions, connect with a comprehensive network of alums and industry leaders, gain real-world experience and thrive as a young professional following a successful launch to full-time employment or graduate school.
