The No. 3 Washington Huskies came into Wells Fargo Arena and handed Arizona State a four set loss 24-26, 25-22, 25-15, 25-17.
The first set included sixteen tied scores and six lead changes, but ASU broke away late to take a 24-21 lead. However, the Huskies fought off three set points to even things up. The Sun Devils recovered and used consecutive kills from freshman outside hitter BreElle Bailey and sophomore outside hitter Macey Gardner to seal the set.
“The thing with Washington is they’re incredibly patient, they don’t make a lot of errors, and I thought the difference was we errored-out and gave them some points that they didn’t,” ASU head coach Jason Watson said. “We dug a ton of balls, we just couldn’t turn those balls for points, and they could.”
Set number two was a game of runs. The score stayed even at 9-9, but a serving streak from UW’s sophomore outside hitter Cassie Strickland opened up the score. The Huskies went on a 6-0 run that included two aces from Strickland before ASU broke her serve on a net violation.
“That serve is a tough serve to handle,” senior libero Stephanie Preach, who finished with a season-high 28 digs, said, “But that definitely brought them back to life.”
After trailing 12-19, the Sun Devils responded with a 7-0 run of their own to even themselves with the Huskies.
Washington broke away with a late 4-1 run and closed out the set on a kill from junior outside hitter Kaleigh Nelson.
The third set started just as close as the previous two. The teams stayed even at nine points apiece again, but UW went on a 12-3 run behind more tough serving from Strickland.
The Huskies imposed their will on the Sun Devils, taking them out of rhythm and out of system, and they never trailed once in set three. Bailey was eventually subbed out by coach Watson and replaced by junior outside hitter Nora Tuioti-Mariner. Up to that point, Bailey had seven kills, eight attacking errors, and a hitting percentage of -.042 and never returned to the match.
“Today, [Bailey] struggled. It doesn’t mean next week she’s going to struggle,” Watson said. “We’re going to go right back to her.”
In set four, UW lead most of the way, but ASU came came within one point before a questionable call sparked a 6-0 run by the Huskies to break away and complete the victory.
Junior setter/defensive specialist Shannan McCready was again at the helm, dishing out fourty assists and recording seventeen digs. Injured sophomore setter Bianca Arellano participated in warm-ups, but Watson made the game-time decision to hold out Arellano.
For much of the night, Gardner and Washington’s junior outside hitter Krista Vansant dueled at the net. Gardner finished with eighteen kills, and Vansant had seventeen of her own. However, Vansant had four less errors than Gardner, and Gardner had a total of 74 attack attempts, twenty-two more than Vansant.
“We just weren’t taking care of what we needed to take care of. We left points on the floor, we weren’t covering balls, we just weren’t taking care of our side of the net,” Preach said.
ASU will look to recover from their first loss in four matches next Thursday against the Colorado Buffaloes in Tempe. The Buffaloes defeated ASU in four sets two weeks ago in Boulder, CO which was the last match Arellano played in before spraining her ankle on match point against Colorado.
“We gotta move on from this one and get better from today. We gotta learn from today and keep grinding and keep pushing, moving forward,” Preach said. “We have next weekend, and we’re going to get two wins next weekend. It’s not gonna go more so on the roller coaster, it’s gonna keep going up.”
You can reach Zac Pacleb on Twitter @ZacPacleb or via email at zacpacleb@gmail.com
