Tide Volleyball Defeats South Carolina; Remains Undefeated in the SEC
9/28/2007 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
TUSCALOOSA, Ala.- The University of Alabama volleyball team overcame South Carolina in the fourth game in a thrilling, 30-15, 30-26, 24-30, 30-21, victory, extending its conference winning streak to five matches. With the win, the Crimson Tide improves to 8-6 overall and 5-0 in the SEC, while South Carolina drops to 7-7 overall and 0-5 in the SEC.
The Tide is off to its best conference start since 2000 and joins Florida as one of two unbeaten teams left in the conference.
"We were ready to play in game one," said Alabama head coach Judy Green. "We started on them right away from the service line and we never gave them a chance to breathe with our sideout and our serving."
Alabama saw a well-rounded team effort in tonight's match with five players hitting over .300 and four players in double-digit digs. On the offensive side of the ball, senior setter Brigitte Slack dished out 53 assists in the winning effort while junior Lindsey Buteyn led all players with a .583 hitting percentage.
On defense, junior libero Amy Pauly tallied over 20 digs for the eighth time this season while Megan Hudson recorded a season-high 16 digs.
"I think it was really good for us to have to play as hard as we did last night. That is how hard we are going to have to play every time we take the court.," Green said.
Alabama came out to a fast start in game one and held on to that momentum through the end of game two. South Carolina rebounded in game three by playing good defense and held the Tide to a .150 team hitting percentage, the lowest of the match.
Game four saw a different flow as the Gamecocks jumped out to a quick lead and forced the Tide to come from behind to clinch the match. Alabama saw itself down by three points as the two team's reached the mid-way point in the game. Behind by two, the Tide went on a an eight-point run off Pauly's serve as the Gamecocks only managed one more point in the game. Hudson finished the match behind the service line as she ripped off the final five points of the game.
"We didn't have a good practice Thursday and we needed to overcome some situations. During South Carolina's last time out I told the team that we needed to end today differently than we did on Thursday and the team responded. As soon as they made that decision they took their game to another level. To me that is a sign of a great team. I think our team will learn a lot from tonight and be good to go on Sunday."
The Tide is back in action Sunday as it hosts the sixth ranked Florida Gators and 1:30 p.m. at the CAVE.
