Volleyball Blanks Holy Cross in League Opener

Tuesday, September 20

Worcester, MA

7 PM

Army West Point

9-6

Holy Cross

4-10

ARMY

Holy Cross

Volleyball Blanks Holy Cross in League Opener

September 20, 2016 | Volleyball

Box Score

WORCESTER, Mass. – The Army West Point volleyball team pulled out a 3-0 victory over Patriot League foe Holy Cross in a tight contest. The Cadets improve to 9-6 on the year and 1-0 in the conference.

ARMY HIGHLIGHTS AND MATCH NOTES

Amber Clay led the offense with 10 kills and a .467 hitting percentage. Vanessa Wesley also chipped in 10 kills and was followed by Allie Strong who tallied eight.
Haven Bethune dished out 32 assists and added three helpers throughout the three setter.
Strong topped the team defensively with 10 digs, while Megan Bryn notched nine and Bethune had seven.
Wesley led the team with four blocks, one being solo.
As a team, Army outscored Holy Cross 51-45 and had seven aces to their four. The Black Knights out-blocked the Crusaders 7-3 and had a 39-35 advantage in digs.

HOW IT HAPPENED

Army and the Crusaders fought a very tight contest in the first two sets. The Black Knights trailed in the beginning of the first set, but overtook the Crusaders 19-16 to force Holy Cross to take a timeout.
The two teams went back and forth until Army led 23-20. The Crusaders stayed in the set however with two consecutive points, but the Black Knights closed-out the set with a kill from Clay and an error by the Crusaders.
With the second set knotted at 15-all, the Black Knights pulled ahead 20-17 after going on a 5-2 run fueled by three kills by Wesley, a service ace by Bryn and a kill by Clay.
Wesley then had a hand in the three of the next five points, including the set winner, with two kills and a block assist alongside Clay.
A 5-1 run in the third set pushed Army out of reach for the Crusaders (19-10). Holy Cross did fight back to score seven more, but the Black Knights had the final three points of the match to clinch.
A bad set infraction was recorded by Holy Cross to start the 3-0 run and a kill by strong and a block by Wesley and Olivia Fairfield ended the set 25-17.

COACHES CORNER

"It is always great to start our Patriot League season with a win," said head coach Alma Kovaci Lee. "Haven did a nice job running our offense and setting the outsides some really good balls. As a result, the outsides hit really well in this match."
"Our blocking struggled in the first two sets, but Holy Cross did a great job setting really high balls. It took us time to adjust, but we did. I also think our bench is fantastic. There is some really great energy which helps everyone on and off the court."

UP NEXT

The Black Knights return to Gillis Field House Sept. 24 for a match against Colgate. The team will celebrate Dig Pink in the game that starts at 4 p.m.

For up-to-date information about Army volleyball, please follow @ArmyWP_VB on Twitter and Instagram.