Two heartbreaking losses and recordbreaking
statistics consumed the Eagles’
weekend games against Mercer, Kennesaw
State, and University of North Florida.
While on the road, the team won 3-2 over
the Bears’ and lost to the Owls (3-0) and
Ospreys (3-2), respectively.
The Eagles started out with a close first
set against the Bears on Friday night. With a
final score of 25-21 in the first set, the leaders
of each set varied throughout the rest of
the match. Although the Eagles were able
to grasp a win for the third set (25-16), they
were defeated 14-25 in the second set and 18-
25 in the fourth set. With an eight-point lead,
the Eagles beat the Bears 15-7.
Kaitlin Holm had a career high number
of kills, 21, while Olivia Mesner and Jessica
Barnes added 14 and 13, respectively. Karina
Mambuca led the team in digs at 17 and
contributed 7 blocks.
Kennesaw State took a big win from
FGCU the next night, 3-0. Although FGCU
had a higher hitting percentage, .382 against
.358 as well as three less errors, it was not
enough to secure a win. The second game
of the weekend quickly ended 25-27, 22-25
and 23-25. Holm again led in kills at six, and
Whitney Masters had 11 digs. KSU now has a
5-7 Atlantic Sun Conference record.
Heartbreak began to sink in on Monday
when the team took on the University of
North Florida Ospreys.
“It was another hard-fought match for us
tonight,” head coach Dave Nichols said in a
interview with FGCU Athletics. “We keep
finding ourselves in these long matches and
I think that our injuries and lack of depth
are starting to wear on us a little bit. Olivia
(Mesner) had an amazing performance with
no errors and we had some great individual
games, but unfortunately we gave up too
many free points. We battled and our effort
was terrific, but we played too sloppy at
times and it caught up to us. It was a heartbreaking
loss for us tonight but the girls
fought to the bitter end and I’m proud of
them for that. ”
Quite a few players had great games
individually in defeat. Four players
contributed in double-digit kills: Mesner,
25, Barnes, 15, Holm, 12 and rookie player
Marlene Moeller with 10. There were 71
total kills for the match. Mambuca also
had a career high record of 22 digs, while
freshman Caroline Jordan had a career high
19 digs. Osprey attacks were stopped from
hitting the floor by Whitney Masters, who
had a total of 12 digs. Monday night was also
the first time the Green and Blue did not win
a full, five-set match.
After a long few days of traveling, the
girls are returning home this week to bring
some action to Alico Arena. The first day of
November will be started off with a game
against ETSU at 7 p.m. while the next game
is the following day against USC Upstate at
the same place and time.