ASU Volleyball: Sun Devils fall in five sets to Cougars in home opener

(Photo: Marlee Smith/WCSN)

After one win and one loss against Washington (1-1) in Seattle last weekend, Arizona State (1-2) suffered a five-set loss (25-17, 26-24, 25-10, 25-23, 16-14) to Washington State (2-1) in its first home match of the season.

Despite dominating the first and fourth sets, the Sun Devils couldn’t rally to win the deciding fifth set.

“In the first set, we really did our jobs well, but the representation we had in the third set just wasn’t us,” sophomore outside hitter Iman Isanovic said. “It was a lot of mental errors and lack of focus that got us to that point.”

The Sun Devils maintained a lead the entire first set — even leading by five or more points on multiple occasions. But the Cougars remained resilient throughout the whole match, utilizing lots of dumping to keep the Sun Devils on their toes.

“I think (Washington State) did a really good job running their middles,” Arizona State head coach Sanja Tomasevic said. “We got to be better at stopping their middles and especially when we know where they’re going.”

Momentum seemed to fizzle out for Arizona State in the latter half of the second set, which aided Washington State’s cause to control the third set and take the win with a 14-point lead, holding Arizona State to only 10 points.

The young Sun Devil offense couldn’t keep up, as freshman setter Ella Snyder struggled to distribute the ball to teammates other than Isanovic.

Isanovic finished the match with a career-high 22 kills on a .200 hitting percentage.

Freshman outside hitter Marta Levinska was named Pac-12 Freshman of the Week after racking up a combined 31 kills in the two matches against Washington. In Thursday’s match, Levinska had 9 kills and a .029 hitting percentage against the Cougars.

“The offense has to be a lot more balanced than this,” Tomasevic said. “We cannot have one player taking seven swings and the next one taking 34. I think Ella did a better job in the last two matches making it more even.”

Snyder celebrated her birthday with 38 assists and 12 digs. Her teammates cheered her on by shouting, “happy birthday” from the sidelines.

Servicing was an issue for the Sun Devils as well, making it more difficult for Snyder to even out the offense. Arizona State had nine service errors and allowed eight service aces by Washington State.

Momentum picked up for the Sun Devils in the fourth set, and a challenge by Tomasevic set them up to win the set 25-23, with the set-winning kill by Isanovic and assisted by sophomore libero Annika Larson.

Rallying to win that fourth set was “just a pride thing,” Isanovic said.

The Sun Devils will focus on remaining consistent from set to set in preparation for their next match against Washington State.

“We have to be disciplined against these good teams in the Pac-12,” Tomasevic said. “We have another day to prepare for Washington State and the good news is; it’s the same team, same referee, same everything. So it’s a re-do on Saturday.”

Arizona State will host Washington State for its second matchup of the season on Saturday at 11 a.m.