Tulane University
Houston
Volleyball Drops A Heart-Breaker At Houston
Sep 21, 2001 | Women's Volleyball
Sept. 21, 2001
HOUSTON, Texas - Senior Erin Dobyanski, junior Britney Hurst and redshirt-freshman Anastasia Kenon all recorded double-doubles, but it was not enough as the Tulane University volleyball team dropped a heart-breaker to Houston in the Conference USA opener, 3-2, Friday night at Hofheinz Pavilion.
Hurst and Kenon each had 18 kills, while Dobyanski tallied 10. Hurst led all players with a match-high 22 digs, followed by Kenon with 21 and Dobyanski with 11. The loss dropped the Green Wave to 6-5 on the year and 0-1 in C-USA competition.
"If we would have played our 'A Game' against them all night, there would have been a different outcome. Unfortunately, we had one player on at a time and the other five off. We've got to be able to have at least three players on top of their game in order to win against teams like Houston.
"But I'm proud of our team's effort. We were hungry and wanted it, but we need to work harder on minimizing our unforced errors. We need to clean it up, put this game behind us and look forward to tomorrow versus UAB."
Coming into the contest, Tulane had just 10 ball handling errors as a team. On Friday night, however, the Green Wave was called for 14 ball handling errors, including 11 on freshman setter Katie Case. Tulane also had 39 attack errors and two block errors which wound up translating into 55 of Houston's 146 points.
The match also marked the return of sophomore middle hitter Lauren Jones-McClain, who had missed the team's previous 10 matches while recovering from abdominal surgery. In her first action of the 2001 season, Jones-McClain tallied two kills, two digs and one block assist.
"Seeing that she hasn't played in six weeks, LJ gave us everything she's got," Becker said. "She came back strong and really didn't miss a beat. I think LJ was a welcome injection of her energy into our team. Anyone who subs into a game either lights the fire or puts it out. Tonight, she was able to light our fire, and we're going to count on her to make that fire get brighter and brighter."
It was a back-and-forth contest throughout game one, but with the scored knotted at 12-all, Houston went on a 3-0 run take the lead. But Tulane responded with a 7-4 lead to tie it up at 19. Houston would once again take the lead, but could not put the Green Wave away. Tulane would take a 28-26 lead on an ace by Kenon, and the Green Wave went on to win the game 30-28.
Game two was all Houston early and often, however as the Cougars roared out to an 11-6 lead. After a Green Wave timeout, Tulane would cut the lead to three on a number of occasions. But with the score 18-15 in Houston's advantage, the Cougars went on a 4-0 run and outscored the Green Wave 12-4 the rest of the way en route to a 30-19 game-two victory.
Houston once again jumped out to the early lead in game three, but the Green Wave battled back from a 10-7 deficit to tie the score at 11-11. Tulane would take a 12-11 advantage on the next ball, but the lead was short lived as Houston scored the next two points and had a five-point as well as a pair of four-point runs to take the contest 30-20.
It was Tulane's turn to take the early lead in the fourth stanza, and the Green Wave looked impressive early on. Tulane jumped out to a 13-10 lead, and was up 24-18 before Houston called a timeout. After the break in the action, the Cougars rattled off six straight points to tie the score. Tulane regrouped after timeout of its own and bounced back to win 30-28 and force a match-deciding game five.
The Green Wave once again took the early lead in game five, holding an 8-6 advantage before the customary switching of sides. But Houston clawed back to tie it at eight, and took a 13-9 lead before Tulane called a timeout to regroup. The Green Wave cut the lead to 13-10 and were behind just 14-12, but Houston held on for a 15-12.
Houston's Jennifer Wittenburg led the Cougars with a match-best 24 kills, followed by Jane Anne Karasek with 19 and Jenny Tanneberger with 15. Gabi Carbone led the Houston defense with 18 digs while Wittenburg and Mirela Vasconcellos each tallied 13.
The Green Wave returns to action tomorrow night when they return to the Big Easy for a 7 p.m. showdown with C-USA foe UAB in Fogelman Arena. The contest will be the first of a four-match home stand as Tulane plays host to league foes Southern Miss on Sept. 25, East Carolina on Sept 28 and Charlotte on Sept. 29.
