The University of St. Thomas volleyball team recorded its second straight sweep, beating the University of the Southwest, 25-20, 25-16, 25-15, Saturday at the Jerabeck Activity & Athletic Center.
The win improved the Celts' record to 19-5 overall, 6-3 in the Red River Athletic Conference. Southwest fell to 9-10, 3-7.
St. Thomas, which has qualified for the RRAC Tournament, sits in fourth place in the league, two losses out of first place with opportunities to make up ground ahead.
The Celts raced out to a 7-3 lead in the first set when Alyssa Ajlouny put away a kill. Southwest tied it at 8-8 on an ace by Autumn Lopez. Kayden Thomas and Sophie Rigaut combined on a block, and Brooke Garcia served the next point to give the Celts an 11-9 lead. The Mustangs tied it again at 11-11 before the two teams traded points on the ensuing two serves.
Garcia slammed home a kill to start a 4-0 run for St. Thomas. Bresha Orange's kill extended the Celts lead to 17-13, and a pair of Emily Jaroszewski blocks made it 19-13. Garcia put away a ball to give UST a 23-16 lead before the Mustangs ran off the next four points to pull within three, 23-20. But Garcia and Thomas each found vacant spots on the floor on the final two serves to help the Celts pull out the most contested set of the match.
UST pounded 17 kills, and committed only one attack error in the first set for a .356 hitting percentage. Southwest hit .050 in the opening set on eight kills and six errors.
St. Thomas held the Mustangs to a negative hitting percentage the rest of the way to win going away. Southwest had a -.071 attack rate in the second set and -.028 in the third. The Mustangs finished the match with a -.010 hitting percentage. The Celts hit .299.
The Celts served seven aces, while the Mustangs finished with two. UST out blocked USW, 12-3.
Orange finished with 13 kills and three blocks. Thomas and Garcia each had seven kills. Thomas added four blocks, and Garcia two. Jaroszewski had four kills and five blocks, while hitting .500. Hannah Westerlage had 15 assists, seven digs and one ace. Kelsie Walker had 12 assists and eight digs. Lauren Fernandez-Miller had 17 digs and two aces.
Corina Madrid had eight kills and seven digs for Southwest. Hannah Massey finished with five kills, two blocks and an ace. Torie Joiner had six kills, a block and a .267 attack percentage.
St. Thomas plays at Prairie View 6:30 p.m. Tuesday before returning home 6 p.m. Friday to host Texas College in an RRAC match. The Celts final homestand is set for Nov. 2-3 versus Huston-Tillotson and Our Lady of the Lake.
"We have a tough weekend for our Senior Weekend against OLLU and HT," Celts coach Keanne Burt said. "We lost to both of them in the first round (of conference play), so coming into those games is a really important weekend before the conference tournament. All the stuff leading into that is just kind of our game plan getting implemented into actual game situations versus just kind of practicing it."
Jim McCurdy
