K-State falls short of top-ranked teams

Three matches against top-25 teams is not an easy feat for any volleyball team, but K-State met the challenge this weekend and put on a strong showing in its season-opening tournament.

On Friday, No. 16 University of California, Los Angeles, swept the Wildcats in neck-and-neck play that boiled down to a few errors and big plays. Following up the next day, No. 5 University of Hawaii, Honolulu, also downed K-State in three games, this time by larger margins. K-State finished the tournament with a narrow defeat by No. 22 University of San Diego, losing in four games by slim numbers.

The Wildcats shot out of the gate with a strong start to the season, matching the top-ranked Bruins point for point in the first game. Sophomore setter Caitlyn Donahue downed a UCLA attack to nab the first point of the match and season, and both sides made a number of errors to bring the score to 6-8 K-State. Down by a narrow margin, the freshmen-heavy Wildcats battled back ferociously to take the advantage 17-15 following an ace from sophomore opposite hitter Kathleen Ludwig. K-State took the drive all the way to match point, but the Bruins proved too difficult to quiet, as they took the first game 26-24.

Mirroring the previous game, K-State again earned the first point, but UCLA slapped together a messy four points for a large margin at 5-1, which the Wildcats wasted no time in closing after icing the Bruins with a timeout. K-State kept the momentum and rode a slight wave of UCLA errors to pull ahead by two 10-8, but the Bruins popped over a few balls to tie up. Cousins Dakota Kaufman, freshman outside hitter, and JuliAnne Chisholm, senior outside hitter, each swung for a few hits, and the solid senior libero Lauren Mathewson lived up to her reputation to continue holding the heavily favored Bruins 15-17. A K-State service error, however, turned the match for the worst, with UCLA breaking far ahead and winning the game 25-18.

K-State came back from the intermission with vengeance and jumped back and forth from tying and slightly edging its opponent until double digits, when the Bruins clawed ahead 14-10. K-State broke the run with a timeout, and Donahue floated a perfect set to Kaufman, who pinned it down between the block. The Wildcats made a last-ditch attempt to avoid a sweep with nearly back-to-back timeouts at 16-21, but the Bruins showed why they can lay claim to their No. 16 ranking, winning the match 25-19.

On Saturday, K-State took the first point with an ace from Chisholm, but it lost a handful after a few mistakes to bring the game to 1-4. A short surge brought the Wildcats back even, but the Rainbow Wahine played off another K-State error streak to power ahead 17-10. The black-and-green-clad team mostly kept the momentum going to force errors on K-State's side and make some attacks to claim the first game 25-16.

Turning around their poor performance from the previous game, the Wildcats nabbed a couple of long rallies to take a substantial lead 8-4. A number of huge blocks later, K-State had jumped ahead even farther to 12-6, but the Rainbow Wahine used a controversial call to mark the turning point in their fortune and put together a six-point run to tie the Wildcats. The teams traded small runs to snake the game into the 20's, but Hawaii nudged out K-State for another game 25-23.

After the 10-minute break, the match slowed down considerably, with errors coming from both sides and a noticeable lack of K-State's speciality: long rallies. Hawaii started to wear into K-State head coach Suzie Fritz's mind at 16-10, as she called her team's last timeout to unsuccessfully stop the Rainbow Wahine run. A quick change in momentum, however, brought back some fervor to the purple side to narrow K-State's gap to 18-22. Nevertheless, the young team's last-ditch rally was not enough, as Hawaii won the match 25-20.

On Sunday, both teams handed out points to open their final match of the Chevron Rainbow Wahine Invitational, until freshman middle blocker Kaitlynn Pelger and Kaufman dealt out five straight hits between the two of them to jump K-State ahead 7-3. Chisholm found her own wind soon after, racking up two more for her team to join Muff's backslide and others in bringing the lead even higher to 14-8. With a .583-team-hitting percentage, K-State lost the rally following a San Diego timeout, allowing the Toreros to score seven straight points and retake the lead 16-15. Down one, Chisholm and Pelger teamed up for a double block — with the latter also scoring an attack — giving K-State hopes for a game win 23-22. A long rally eventually opened up with a cross-court hit from Chisholm immediately followed by a Torero attack error to show K-State its first game win of the season.

With the stakes raised, both teams charged out at full speed for the second game, but neither could find significant favor despite impressive plays on both sides, including a risky save from freshman defensive specialist Tristan McCarty and well-timed second-hit attack from Donahue. A K-State service error took the rally over the court 11-7 San Diego. From there, the Toreros continued their conquest to even the match score with a long run up to 21-14, frozen by K-State's timeout. The Wildcats snatched up two more points, but San Diego left for intermission with its own game and a closer match.

The Toreros stormed out of the break for a formidable 6-2 lead, but K-State quickly closed the gap with a few attacks and forced errors. Muff broke her season record in attacks and paired with Mathewson's near-ace serving to drive her team to an 8-all deadlock that lasted for a few points, until double kills from freshman outside hitter Courtney Cook gave the advantage to the Wildcats 12-9. A series of solid digs and attacks kicked off a four-point K-State drive to plunk the team up to 16-12, but the Toreros once again leveled off the score with their own run, leading Fritz to call a timeout. Two costly Wildcat errors brought the Toreros to a 23-22 lead, and a net violation took the team to set point, with a San Diego block tipping the scales to give the Toreros a match lead 2-1.