The FGCU Volleyball team picked up two more wins this last weekend as well as winning its first ASUN conference match with wins over Bethune Cookman and Stetson.
“We were really good from the service line and that’s been something over the last couple weeks that’s really dictated quite a few of our matches,” said head coach Matt Botsford.
In match number one versus Bethune Cookman, FGCU got off to a tough start trailing most of the first set, but one of Amanda Carroll’s seven kills in the first set tied the score up at 14.
The Eagles went up 19-17, forcing the Wildcats to call a time out and despite losing their first set point chance, FGCU won the next point, taking the first set 25-22.
In set two, FGCU held Bethune Cookman to a .033 attacking percentage in the set. After going up 14-7, Sharonda Pickering took over and helped lead the Eagles to a 25-13 set win.
“The blocking was pretty good in the first set but we still weren’t doing our job from the floor,” Botsford said. “The second set it turned around though. Those two things started working in unison with one another and we held them to a low efficiency.”
After the break, the Wildcats hung around with FGCU, as they only trailed by one early on.
Courtney VanLiew put the Eagles ahead 13 to 11.  Shortly after, FGCU forced Bethune Cookman into a couple timeouts and came away with a 25-19 third set win.
After the win, the Eagles headed to Deland less than 24 hours later and once again took the match in three sets.
Similar to Friday, it took the Eagles a bit of time to get going. VanLiew tied the match at eight with a kill, and Carroll followed that up with consecutive aces to put the Eagles ahead 10-8.
FGCU continued to serve well, as Courtney Stephens had an ace in an during a 14-6 run that set up set-point for the Eagles, which Pickering ended with a kill.
Using the momentum from set one, FGCU opened up a 19-11 lead in the second set and easily went into the break up two sets to nine with a 25-14 lead.
It wasn’t easy for the Eagles to close out the match, as the Hatters came out winning the first four points, forcing Botsford to take a time out.
Though down by two, Danielle Serrano had back-to-back kills to tie the set up at eight.
FGCU went on another run to take the lead, but Stetson matched that evening with the score at 18. The two teams traded points until Kaiti Krivdo put the Eagles ahead by one.
After a Hatter error to set up match point, Krivdo finished the match with another kill to give the Eagles the win.
“I thought we handled the ball pretty well in the first two sets, obviously things got pretty sloppy in the third but I’m glad the kids were able to battle it out. Dani (Serrano) and Kaitlan (Krivdo) both hit over .500 tonight and played really well in that third set. Krivdo hit at a really high efficiency and Dani, when we made some changes, stepped up and showed a lot of leadership.”
With the win, FGCU moves to 9-5 (1-0) and will get ready to travel to Kennesaw State for a match on Friday, Sept. 29 at 7 p.m.