Box Score HONOLULU – Some teams hate the term "moral victories." But the Chaminade women's volleyball may have found some in a tough 26-24, 27-25, 25-23 loss to California Baptist in a Pacific West Conference match Friday at McCabe Gym.
The Silverswords (5-11, 2-9 PacWest) twice held leads of eight in the first two sets and six in the third, but were unable to fend off the Lancers, who maintained a hold of second place in the PacWest, improving to 14-6 overall and 11-1.
CUH came out clicking on all cylinders in the first set, jumping out to a 13-5 lead behind three
Kim Spring kills, along with successful attacks by
Kapiolani Rapoza,
Reigna Johnson and
Kylee Pedro. However, the Lancers came storming back, cutting the deficit to 23-22. A
Cassie Rushlow kill made it 24-22, but CBU staved off three set points and scored the set's final three to take a 1-0 lead.
The second set saw Chaminade take a 19-11 advantage, but a 10-3 Lancer run cut the Swords' lead to 23-22. CUH would twice have set point via kills from Rushlow and Pedro, but again, CBU scored the final three points to take the second.
In Set 3, the Swords again opened up a lead, taking an 11-5 advantage on Spring's three kills and service ace, along with four Lancer attack errors. But for the third straight set, California Baptist rolled up its sleeves and chipped away, taking its first lead of the set at 20-19. Chaminade made one last push with a Pedro kill, forcing two hitting errors, followed by a successful Rapoza attack to take a 23-22 lead. But once again, the Lancers scored the final three points to take the match.
Spring led CUH with 12 kills and seven digs, while Rapoza slammed down nine. Johnson had four total blocks, while
Brenda Walker had 15 digs. And the two-headed setting tandem of
Daniella Montoya and Valentina Bevilaqua had 16 and 14 assists, respectively. Lauren Marr led CBU with 11 kills.
As a team, Chaminade piled up 60 digs, the most in a 3-set match this season. The Swords also held the Lancers to a .168 attacking percentage, 46 points below their season average. And despite the setback, the team feels it can still make some noise in the standings as the season comes down to its home stretch.
"We just try to talk to each other about being mentally tough," Montoya said. "In order to close out games like that, we've got to be strong mentally in order to correct little mistakes like we made tonight and if we can clean up on those, we'll be able to take it."
Chaminade is back at the McCabe Gym floor Saturday as they face Azusa Pacific, its third match in as many days. It was moved up to 5 p.m. to accommodate the Cougars' travel arrangements. Live streaming audio will be available on goswords.com.
