CHARLESTON, S.C. – College of Charleston worked through a rough first two sets to climb to a 3-0 (25-23, 25-23, 25-20) victory over Delaware on Friday night at TD Arena.
The Cougars (19-4, 9-0) kept their winning streak alive by taking its ninth-straight match against CAA opponents and 10th sweep of the season, while Delaware (11-13, 3-7) lost ground on its fight to make the CAA tournament.
Despite making 16 hitting errors in the first two sets, Charleston responded with a .485 third set to finish with a .259 hitting percentage, higher than its league-leading .257 average. The Cougars won the battle in kills (47-34), digs (52-36) and blocks (9-4), as Charleston continued its statistical domination over CAA opponents.
Darcy Dorton led the team with 12 kills, but they came at the expense of nine errors (.097). Sloane White posted her 11th double-digit kill performance, sixth against the CAA, with 10 kills and a .360 attacking percentage. Melissa Morello and Cara Howley each added seven kills. Kerstin Koehler finished with five blocks to lead the net defense.
Kallie McKown led the team with 21 assists to go with six digs, while Taeler Davis had 19 assists. Andi Zbojniewicz had a match-high 16 digs, and she is now averaging 4.15 digs in conference play.
Delaware's Kate Hillman put down 10 kills to lead the Blue Hens, and Katie Hank added nine. Libero Ariel Shonk made 11 digs.
The first set played ugly for the Cougars with a number of errors early on. Charleston recovered to take a 17-12 lead, and eventually went up 21-14 after a Koehler kill. But Delaware responded after a timeout with a 5-0 run to cut it to 21-19. The Blue Hens staved off two set points to draw to 24-23, but a service error ended the set for Charleston, 25-23.
Things played similarly in the second set with errors and inconsistent play on both sides. A block and kill from Hillman tied Charleston at 21, but CofC responded with a kill from Emily Neideffer and two blocks from Koehler. Delaware made things interesting again at 24-23, but White dashed any hopes with a kill to win 25-23.
The Cougars maintained a two- or three-point lead throughout most of the third set, thanks to much-improved hitting. Charleston only made three errors in the set and hit .485 with a 76 sideout percentage. Dorton came alive to terminate six of her 12 kills in the third set, while Morello and White each had four. White's 10th kill of the match ended things at 25-20 and kept the Cougars undefeated in league play.
Charleston finishes the weekend against Towson at 1 p.m. on Sunday from TD Arena.
