Nov. 14, 2010
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By Sarah Tarasewicz
UCFAthletics.com
ORLANDO, Fla. (UCFAthletics.com) - Redshirt freshman Angelica Crump (Atlanta, Ga.) posted a career-best 22 kills and added two block assists as the UCF (13-15, 6-10 C-USA) volleyball team dropped a Conference USA match to second-place SMU, 3-1 (16-25, 31-29, 21-25, 14-25), Sunday afternoon at The Venue at UCF.
"This loss is a very frustrating one for us," head coach Todd Dagenais said following the match. "I just don't feel like we are that far behind these teams. When we get into matches like this our top players have to play well and everybody else has to do their part to support our top players. Everybody has a role on this team and we had too many people not playing their role today. We made too many mental errors to be able to run with a good team like SMU."
Along with Crump, junior Kristin Fisher (Clearwater, Fla.) also posted double-digit kills against the Mustangs (23-5, 15-2 C-USA) with 14, while totaling 12 digs and three blocks for her 11th double-double of 2010. Nichole Riedel (Denver, Colo.) added seven kills and three blocks, and fellow middle blocker Tory McCutcheon (Milton, Ont.) pitched in five kills and a block for the home team.
Also posting a double-double in the contest was setter Rachel Vukson (Oakville, Ont.). The junior dished out 42 assists and posted 14 digs for her seventh double-double of the year, while also registering two blocks and a service ace.
Libero Meredith Murphy (Austin, Texas) led the Knights' defense with 21 digs, four assists and a service aces, and Dani Harrison (Tallahassee, Fla.) recorded her eighth double-digit dig outing of the season with 11.
"I thought that defensively we were pretty good," Dagenais said. "We put our best players in position to get some digs, but I thought that we could have had a lot more. Even as many digs as we had on defense, we probably left 10 or 15 out there that were really critical for us."
After falling in the opening set, 16-25, the Knights came back to take a thriller from the visiting Mustangs in the second. The two squads traded leads seven times and tied 20 times in the contest, with the Black and Gold coming out on top, 31-29. UCF and SMU were tied, 9-9, before a Fisher kill ignited the Knights to a 4-0 run and a four-point lead. But, the Mustangs put together their own 5-0 run to once again even the contest at 14-14. The home team jumped out to another four-point advantage following a kill from Crump, but the two squads again found themselves even at 19-19. Ten more tie scores followed, and with the score deadlocked at 29-29, Fisher and Vilde posted back-to-back kills to even the match, 1-1, heading into the locker room.
The Black and Gold hit .231 in the set, totaling 20 kills compared to 17 for the Mustangs.
The third set was another tight contest between the two squads, but this time it was SMU that came out on top. UCF fell behind early, but a 4-0 run behind the serving of Murphy evened the set for the first time, 10-10. A total of 10 more tied scores and four lead changes followed before the Mustangs took their final lead of the set 19-20 on a kill. The Knights managed to pull within two points late, 20-22, on a kill from Fisher, but a 3-1 run by the visitors ended the Black and Gold threat and the set.
Once again UCF fell behind early, but this time it was not able to recover. The Mustangs rattled off six-straight points to open the third set and it proved to take the wind out of the Knights' sails. The closest the home team came to catching SMU was midway through when it pulled to within five at 7-12, but three-straight points by the visiting squad stopped the rally. The Black and Gold scored seven more points in the set, but ran out of time in both the set and the match.
The Knights will play three-straight matches away from The Venue at UCF to wrap up their regular-season road schedule beginning Friday, Nov. 19 at Memphis. The Black and Gold will also play UAB and UTEP on the road during the stretch.