NORFOLK, Va. – Old Dominion volleyball came up short 3-1 against Wake Forest on Saturday afternoon at the ODU Volleyball Center.
ODU falls to 2-8 on the season while WFU moves to 6-5. The match marked the first meeting between the two programs.
“I thought we started off real strong,” ODU head coach Fred Chao said afterwards. “I think we executed a lot of things real well to begin with, but then when you come across a team like Wake Forest where they have size and speed, when the pressure gets built up, we started to lose our edge a little bit. But overall, I’m happy with our fight.”
WFU 3, ODU 1
The Monarchs started off with a 2-point lead in the first set with a kill by Elisa Maggi making the score 11-9. The team kept their lead with two back-to-back kills by the Monarchs, one coming from Rita Bendito and the second coming from Maggi to go ahead 20-17. The set ended with two service errors for a 25-22 tally that put the Monarchs on the board first.
Wake Forest came out to a hot start in the second set as they built a 12-7 lead and extended their cushion to 14-8 as ODU took a timeout. But then it quickly got out of hand as multiple hitting errors by the Monarchs and a few kills by Wake Forest made the score 19-11. Wake Forest committed a hitting error and a kill by Emma Schelah got ODU to 13 points before a kill by Wake Forest finished the set at 25-13 to tie the match at 1-1.
The Demon Deacons took an early 8-4 lead in the third set. However, the Monarchs closed the gap quickly as Maggi scored three straight kills to trim the visitor lead to 10-9. The visiting team had a big response themselves with a 8-2 swing that made it 18-12. Another momentum change happened for ODU as Bryanna Jones scored two kills and served an ace to close the gap, 20-17. However, the Deacs closed out the set with a 5-0 run to close the set at 25-17.
Set four started off with back-and-forth scoring as Wake Forest held a narrow 8-7 lead. Things got out of reach though, as the Deacs outpaced the Monarchs 12-3 to pull away 20-10. Wake Forest closed out the set and the match with a 25-13 final.
Maggi led the Monarchs with 15 kills, and behind her was Jones with seven kills. Kyra Hampton also helped out the offense with a season high 18 assists, and not far behind her was Wiktoria Zagumny with 13 assists. Kate Kilpatrick and Adrienne Peji finished with 16 and 10 digs, respectively, and LeeAnne Lowery made a team-high four blocks.
Asked about Hampton getting some more reps at setter, Chao added, “Kyra is great. We’re happy that there was an opportunity for her to show what she can do. Wiktoria has been running the offense, and she’s done a great job. But we had to make a change in the middle of the second set and Kyra did a fine job.”
There were 10 ties in the match with only two lead changes.
Up Next
The Monarchs will be in Richmond tomorrow afternoon as they close out the VCU Invitational with a 2 p.m. match versus NC State at the Siegel Center.
“For us, it’s a matter of regrouping and getting back out there. We still have so much room to grow right now. Even though our record doesn’t show it, we’re still getting better and better.”