Sun Devils cruise past Cal Poly, open at home with victory

(Photo: Tamsyn Stonebarger/WCSN)

The No. 18 Arizona State Sun Devils played their first match at home tonight against the Cal Poly Mustangs and cruised to a straight-sets sweep: 25-19, 25-14, 25-19.

The Sun Devils were greeted by an energetic crowd, something that was initially a concern for head coach Jason Watson.

“We talk about going on the road being tough. I think it’s tough coming home,” Watson said. “I think there was some unrealistic expectations upon us. We’re still very much a work in progress and I think they want it to be perfect.”

In the first set, it was all about BreElle Bailey. The 6-foot-4 right-side hitter scored three of the Sun Devils’ first six points, and she finished the set with three kills and two solo blocks. By the end of the match she’d collected nine kills, three solo blocks, and three block assists.

“[Bailey] can score some points on the right side,” Watson said. “Being 6-4 is good for a lot of things.”

Set two was all Arizona State. Macey Gardner had five of her 10 kills as the Sun Devils went on a 10-1 run to distance themselves midway through the set. Cal Poly struggled attacking, ending the set with two more attacking errors than they had kills.

Arizona State was dominant at the net tonight, notching a total of 13 blocks. Their blockers’ presence affected Cal Poly’s attack as they began to lose their aggression at the net.

“We work every day before practice,” said middle blocker Mercedes Binns of the Sun Devils’ success at the net. “It’s a team effort.”

Arizona State never trailed in the third set, and easily completed the sweep of the Mustangs.

Middle blockers Whitney Follette and Binns arguably had their most productive match of the year, both of them putting up nine and six kills respectively.

“I’m really working on forcing the middles even on a pass off the net a little,” Arellano said. “Our outsides are taking a lot of swings obviously, so it’s good to get some confidence and to get some connection going with our middles.”

As a whole, the Sun Devils displayed a balanced attack. Each Sun Devil hitter had at least five kills for the match. Setter Bianca Arellano finished with 32 assists, following up her Pac-12 Player of the Week award and equaling her total in Arizona State’s upset over the Texas Longhorns last weekend.

“We passed well enough for [Arellano] to spread things around,” Watson said.  “I think Macey is Macey so she’s wonderful, but she can’t carry us. She carried us about as far as you can carry us last year as a true freshman. She’s better of course but in order for us to do what we want to do then we got to be a little bit more balanced and certainly it’s nice when that happens.”

“When teams scout us, they know that ball is going to Macey,” Arellano said. “You want to get everybody else going because Macey is going to get us kills no matter what.”

As a team, the Sun Devils had 12 more kills, seven more blocks, and seven fewer attacking errors than the Cal Poly Mustangs.

“We’re actually really good,” said Binns. “I think every team should be scared of us this year.”

The Sun Devils will play Alabama State Saturday at 12 p.m. and Louisiana-Monroe in the night cap at 7 p.m. at Wells Fargo Arena.

You can reach Zac Pacleb on Twitter @ZacPacleb and via email at zacpacleb@gmail.com

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