College of Charleston
Western Carolina
College of Charleston runs win streak to 11 consecutive matches with 3-0 win over Western Carolina
11/15/2008 5:00:00 AM | Volleyball
Boxscore - Western Carolina at College of Charleston
CHARLESTON, S.C. - Sophomore setter Cole Dawley (Charleston, S.C.) dished out a match-high 38 assists and freshman middle blocker Elyse Chubb (Peachtree City, Ga.) drilled a match-high 14 kills with five blocks as the College of Charleston (23-6, 16-1) defeated Western Carolina (6-25, 3-14) 3-0 Saturday afternoon in a Southern Conference volleyball match in Charleston, S.C. The Cougars claimed their 11th straight victory by scores of 25-9, 25-20 and 25-19.
Charleston wasted little time at the start of Game 1, jumping out to leads of 5-1 and 9-5 before back-to-back kills by the Catamounts made it 9-7. From that point, it was all downhill for Western Carolina as the Cougars used a dominating 16-2 run to close out the set with a 25-9 victory.
That run featured nine kills and was capped off by back-to-back kills from Elyse Chubb and sophomore outside hitter Whitney Russell (Decatur, Ga.) as the Cougars went up 1-0 in the match. For the set, Chubb recorded five kills while Cole Dawley dished out 14 assists.
It was a very different story in the second game as the two teams battled out to an early 3-3 tie before CofC mounted a 5-0 run, fueled by five kills, two each from Chubb and Dawley, to pull ahead 8-3. The Catamounts would eventually claw their way back to take a 14-13 lead behind an 11-5 run.
At that point, the two teams would be separated by no more than a point at any one time as they battled through six ties to knot the score at 19-19. A 5-1 run by Charleston then ended the back-and-forth affair with the Cougars coming out on top at 25-20 and extending their lead in the match to 2-0.
Another tightly contested affair, Game 3 featured four early ties as the two squads found themselves deadlocked at 4-4. A 4-0 Charleston run gave them back the lead at 8-4 before Western Carolina rallied to tie the set at 9-9. With the score knotted at 11-11, the Cougars used another 4-0 run to pull back ahead 15-11 and pushed their advantage to 19-13. After withstanding a late rally from the Catamounts, CofC closed out the set, and the match, with a 25-19 victory.
Junior setter Katie Hennessey led the Western Carolina offense with four kills and 12 assists to go along with three blocks while freshman middle blocker Rebecca Stoltz added four kills and four blocks. Defensively, freshman middle blocker Carrie Minogue posted a match-high seven blocks, two solo, while freshman defensive specialist finished with a team-high 11 digs. Senior defensive specialist Liz McLauchlin added seven digs and sophomore outside hitter Kara Lynzee Brookes finished with three blocks.
For the Cougars, Elyse Chubb played a nearly flawless match as she pounded 14 kills, hit a career-high .765, totaled five blocks and committed only one attack error in 17 attempts. Junior outside hitter Emily Sawin (New Lenox, Ill.) drilled ten kills for her fifth straight double-figure kill performance, and seventh in her last eight, while adding six digs and Whitney Russell pounded nine kills and added four blocks,
Cole Dawley was the person setting up all of those kills as she recorded a match-high 38 assists to go along with four kills, five digs and two blocks. As effective as Dawley was on offense, freshman libero Emily Shelton (Cincinnati, Ohio) captained the defense with a match-best 15 digs while freshman defensive specialist Hayley Harrell (Charleston, S.C.) chipped in with nine digs.
The Cougars close out the regular season tomorrow afternoon when they host Appalachian State at Bishop England High School. First serve is set for 1:00 p.m.
NOTES
With her ten kills against Western Carolina, Sawin is now 10 kills away from moving into sixth place on the Cougars career kills list with 1,086 ... the College of Charleston has now won the last 14 matches against Western Carolina, dating back to October 6, 2001.
