NORFOLK, Va. – Old Dominion volleyball was kept out of sync all night as the Monarchs dropped their Sun Belt match to App State, 3-0 on Friday night at the ODU Volleyball Center.
Asked about this weekend’s conference-opening series, ODU head coach Fred Chao said, “We learned that not only are we capable of a very low performance, but we haven’t figured out how to get ourselves out of it yet.”
On getting ready for next week’s Sun Belt series at Georgia Southern, Chao added, “We really don’t have a choice. We have to move ahead, but we have to figure out what the actual path is. Tonight, it didn’t even look like we played a level of volleyball that we’re capable of. It’s one thing for App State to come out and execute as well as they did, but it’s another thing for us to make as many unforced errors as we did.”
App State 3, ODU 0
A solo block by Emma Schelah gave ODU its first lead of the night, 2-1 in the opening set. After App State’s Delanie Grevengoed tied the score at 2-2, Erica Duffy connected with Weronika Urbanska to put the Monarchs (4-9, 0-2 Sun Belt) back in front. Leilani Lawrence scored a kill for another tie at 4-4, and Wiktoria Zagumny assisted Emma DiRocco to knot things up again at 5-5. The Mountaineers (9-7, 2-0) took over the match from there, rattling off five unanswered points to grab a 10-5 lead. Schelah converted an attack to narrow the gap, 11-8, but Amelia Mancino served a pair of aces to highlight a 7-0 run by the visitors. ODU countered with four-straight points of their own, but Grevengoed served three consecutive aces to widen the gap, 23-13. App State then captured the first set point at 25-17.
The Mountaineers opened the second set with a 5-0 run before Katie Rakoski terminated a ball and recorded a block with Schelah. ODU was unable to put together multiple points, and App State put together another 5-0 run to close out the set, 25-9.
App State’s MeMe Davis served a pair of aces early in the third set as Old Dominion was forced to burn a timeout after trailing, 7-1. A block by Zagumny and Schelah and then an ace by Schelah cut the deficit to 10-4, but the Mountaineers scored another six straight to pull away, 16-4. A couple of App State errors got ODU back to within 10 at 16-6, but the Monarchs wouldn’t get any closer as they dropped the final set, 25-10.
Schelah and DiRocco led ODU with four kills each, followed by Urbanska with three. Duffy had 11 assists and Schelah served the team’s lone ace on the night. Adrienne Peji, Elisa Maggi, and Lawrence finished with six digs each while Schelah led the defensive effort at the net with five blocks.
The Monarchs were held to season lows of 18 kills, 17 assists, the one ace, and 24 points. The Mountaineers offense swung for a combined .356 hitting percentage and out blocked the Silver and Blue, 11-5. Friday’s match had just five ties and only two lead changes, all in the first set.
Up Next
ODU will travel to Statesboro, Georgia next weekend for a Sun Belt series at Georgia Southern. The Monarchs and Eagles will play at 6 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 2 and at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 3.