Sports > April 5, 2007

By Ryan Durham

Sports editor

The Wake Forest volleyball team went into their first home tournament of the spring season with positive momentum gained from the first tournament March 24 in Durham. The Deacs started off the day with a slow start against the Pirates of East Carolina. Wake Forest looked strong in the first game between the two teams and took the first win of the day 30-25, but the Deacs were unable to hold off the East Carolina attack in the second game, losing their only game of the day 30-27.

After the loss to the Pirates, Wake Forest could have easily slacked off, but the team came out strong in the next set of games against High Point University.

Wake Forest took the first match from the Panthers with a convincing eight-point margin 30-22. High Point did not let this dissuade their attack, attempting to come back in game two and give the Deacs yet another loss on the day.

Wake Forest had different plans for the match though, and despite a strong attack from the Panthers, the Deacs took the game 30-27, making them 3-1 on the day. Wake Forest’s third match of the day came against the Highlanders of Radford University.

The Deacs allowed their momentum from the first two matchups to continue into the games against the Highlanders, giving Wake two easy wins.

The Deacons took the first game in the match by a convincing 11-point margin, and still had enough energy to take the second game by a nine-point margin, making the Deacs 5-1 in the tournament. Wake Forest’s final match of the day came against ACC-rival N.C. State, who the Deacons had seen only a week earlier in Durham.

In the first meeting, the Deacs won both games, and the team looked to do that once more on the home court.

Wake Forest did just that by defeating the Wolfpack in both games by an eight and seven-point margin respectively. This made the Deacs 7-1 in the home tournament and makes them 12-4 in game play during the spring season. Junior middle blocker Jackie Lucas led the team in the tournament with .64 blocks and 2.86 kills per game.

Also producing offensively was freshman outside hitter Kate Rodriguez, who finished the day with three kills per game.

In addition to Rodriguez and Lucas, redshirt sophomores middle blocker Natalie Mullikin and outside hitter Jessica Furlong had a two-plus kills per game average, at 2.5 and 2.4 kills respectively. Furlong suffered a concussion in last weekend’s tournament in Durham, but recovered to play in the tournament.

Still out with injuries for the Deacs are freshmen outside hitter Sally Fischer and middle blocker Lindsay Gardner.

“I thought the team was very competitive this past weekend considering we were hit with some injuries and illnesses last week,” Head Coach Heather Kahl Holmes said. 

“We had to focus our practices around more individual skill work, rather than team play. ”

The Deacs will return to action April 5 at home when they face off against Winthrop. They will then host another tournament April 14.

“Considering how young we are with two juniors, four sophomores, six freshman, I am impressed with how much further along we are at this point then we were last spring, Holmes said.