Garza notched season-high 13 kills. Davis added 11, and team made 10 aces in win over Schreiner.
Garza notched season-high 13 kills. Davis added 11, and team made 10 aces in win over Schreiner.
Posted: Oct 01, 2017

Volleyball edges Schreiner for 1st Conference Win; Split Sunday's Cross-Divisional

SEGUIN, Texas – The University of Dallas volleyball team captured its first Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) win over Schreiner University. The Crusaders edged Schreiner in four sets (25-13, 25-18, 16-25, and 25-16) to snap a five-game slide. No. 4 Trinity University topped the Crusaders in three sets (25-20, 25-10, 25-18) to complete the cross-divisional later Sunday afternoon.

A Rylee Davis (Lampasas, Texas) kill sparked a stretch of seven straight points to propel the Crusaders to an 11-4 advantage in the opening set. Kennedy Bradley (Groesbeck, Texas) tallied a service ace, a pair of attack errors, back-to-back kills by Sarah Hughes (Fair Oaks, Calif.) and Davis, and then another hitting miscue strung the run along. UD's lead ballooned to as many as 12, as Bradley's other ace marked the first double-digit margin for the Crusaders at 22-12.

The first 20 serves in the second set were even as the teams played to a 10-all score. Kills by Hughes and Samantha Garza (Richmond, Texas) broke the tie. An ace by Elizabeth Smith (Broken Arrow, Okla.) counted as the next point, and then Garza contributed one of her personal-best 13 kills. An attack error by the Mountaineers capped a stretch of five straight points and was the turning point that put UD up 2-0.

Schreiner responded in the third set with a 25-16 win, but the Crusaders countered with the same tally in the final frame to win a matchup that featured two squads that entered 0-5 in SCAC play.

Dallas notched double-digits in kills in all its sets it won, with 15, 13, and 14, respectively. Altogether the team recorded 48 kills (tied 3rd best on the season), which was the third time to match that number. The previous opponents were Johnson & Wales University and LaGrange College.

Garza paced the team with 13 kills and Davis contributed 11, which was one shy of a career-high at Southwestern Adventist University. Hughes nearly missed a double-double with nine kills and 20 digs. Diana Hassink (Tulsa, Okla.) garnered a conference-best 26 digs and eclipsed 20 for two straight games. The Crusaders etched their most digs in an SCAC match with 81.

Smith totaled 29 assists for a season-high. The team landed 10 service aces, which was the fourth time to garner double figures in that category this season.

Amanda Combs led Schreiner with 13 kills. Alexis Coronado made 19 assists and Ashley Myers contributed 13.

In the second match, fourth-ranked Trinity hit .298 and compiled 42 kills to ease by the Crusaders with a straight set sweep. The Tigers clobbered 17 kills in the first frame, but UD kept up with that margin being the narrowest of the evening by five.

The Crusaders opened with the first pair of points, before TU rolled in front with four straight. Another pair of points countered to Dallas thanks to some miscues by the opposition knotted the score at four. Overall there were eight ties in the set. Trinity swung the momentum with a quartet of kills in a row that included two by Lindsey Lubianksi to break a 12-12 deadlock. Lubianksi finished with a game-high 15 kills.

Bradley ended the four-point stretch with a kill to make it 16-13. Three plays later, Skyler Doty (Mesquite, Texas) delivered an ace to cut the margin to 18-15. Moments later, Hughes put down a kill and Smith went back-to-back on aces to close the gap 21-19. Four-of-five points went to the nationally ranked Tigers and gave them a 1-0 edge.

The next two sets favored Trinity as it improved to 16-3 and 6-1 in the SCAC. Dallas concluded the cross-divisional 1-3 and are now 6-13 overall (1-6 SCAC). Garza led the UD hitters with six kills. Smith chipped in a double-double with 11 assists and 10 digs.

Trinity's Kirby Smith followed Lubianksi with nine kills and totaled a game-high 16 digs. Amelia Roden and Katrina Lieberman each gave 16 assists.

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UP NEXT

Dallas plays a non-conference match with Randall University on October 5th. First serve is at 7 p.m. in one of the last two games in the Maher Center this season. Fans be sure to attend #TropicalThursday as the starters plan to throw out little beach balls during the lineup announcements.