Volleyball Opens NIVC With win Over Wildcats in Four

Friday, December 6

Hamilton, NY

3 PM

Tulane University

22-10, 10-6American

New Hampshire

17-10, 7-3AE

New Hampshire

Tulane

Photo by: Justin Wolford

Volleyball Opens NIVC With win Over Wildcats in Four

Dec 6, 2019 | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

HAMILTON, N.Y. – With the match tied at 1-1, the Tulane volleyball team won the next two sets to rally past a scrappy New Hampshire team to advance in the 2019 National Invitational Volleyball Championship with a 25-17, 20-25, 25-18, 25-21 victory Friday afternoon at Colgate University.

After jumping out to a blistering start, the Green Wave (22-10) found out quickly that the Wildcats (17-10) were not going to go away quietly and would have to see the match out in the end to advance to Saturday's final and advance in their second consecutive postseason appearance.

"New Hampshire played hard, and we had a couple players out of sync but we were able to pick it up in other areas," head coach Jim Barnes said.

Two players that were on for Tulane in the match was freshman middle Lauryn Green and sophomore hitter Yvette Burcescu. Green finished the match with a season-high 13 kills on a .458 hitting clip and team-leading nine blocks. Burcescu had 11 kills and hit .450 in the match with three blocks.

Junior setter Jenna Ibieta led the team with 17 assists, adding five digs a service ace and a block. Amanda Giardina had 13 assists and eight digs for the Green Wave.

"I'm proud of Jenna and Lauryn connecting the way they did today. Lauryn had a big match for us and played tremendous and Jenna is a big reason for that," Barnes said. "And Yvette just put balls away for us when we really needed it. Especially when we were out of system."

Kaylie McHugh led Tulane with 12 digs in the match, chipping in with seven assists and a service ace, battling through a late injury but never leaving the match.

"She's just a player that can change a match. She just powered through and shows you how tough she is," Barnes said.

After a two-week break following the conference tournament, the Green Wave got off to a hot start returning to the court by rattling off the first three points of the match against the Wildcats to take an early lead. A kill from Kayla Dinkins made it 4-1 Tulane, with a kill from Green making it 5-2.

New Hampshire was able to cut the Tulane lead to just a single point at 5-4, but a kill from Ibieta, Erika Hansel and a service ace from Lexie Douglas forced the Wildcats into using the first timeout of the match trailing the Green Wave 8-4.

With the score 13-10 in favor of Tulane, the Green Wave went on a 4-0 string that included an overturned call due to replay to take a seven-point lead at 17-10. Tulane wound up outscoring New Hampshire 7-2 over that stretch and UNH called its final timeout of the set trailing 20-12.

The Wildcats was able to stave off set point three times, but Tulane was able to take the first set in comfortable fashion 25-17 and finishing with a .478 hitting clip and 16 kills.

New Hampshire won the first point of the second set, but Tulane stormed back by taking the next five. However the Wildcats proved to be up for the challenge in the second frame, squaring up the next four to tie the set at 5-5.

From there the two sides battled to seven ties and four lead changes until Tulane broke the one at 13-13 getting a kill from Burcescu and Dinkins to take a 15-13 lead into the media timeout. Still, the Wildcats rallied by scoring the next three after that to take the lead back at 16-15 before a service error tied the set again.

Tulane took its final lead at 17-16, as the Wildcats saw the set through as they outscored the Green Wave 9-3 to even the match at 1-1 with the 25-20 set victory.

The Green Wave were able to get out to a solid start early thanks to some sloppy play by the opposition and jumped out to a 7-2 lead early in the third set. Once again, New Hampshire found a way to bounce back and scored four consecutive points to cut the Tulane lead to just one at 7-6.

Tulane took its biggest lead of the match thanks to its defense and prowess at the net, as the squad broke out with a 5-0 run fueled by four consecutive blocks to take a 21-12 lead over the Wildcats.

New Hampshire didn't make things easy scoring the next five after that to stifle the momentum for Tulane, but the Wildcats only scored one more point after that as Tulane went up 2-1 in the match by pulling out the set 25-18.

A big lead to start unfortunately wouldn't help Tulane too much in the fourth set, with the Green Wave taking seven of the first 10 points and having that lead quickly evaporate as the Wildcats scored four-straight to tie the set at 7-7, leaving both in a tussle for the lead and the momentum after that.

With New Hampshire up 9-8, Tulane got a kill from Dinkins, UNH attack error and a kill from Lizzy Stefanov to go up 11-9. While the Wildcats got the next two, a Burcescu kill and a solo block from Douglas forced UNH into a timeout down 13-11.

After a Wildcat point, Tulane proceeded to take 10 of the next 13 points to go up 23-14 and got to match point leading 24-15. Being down by as many points as they were, New Hampshire could have folded up shop and cede the match to Tulane, but to the Wildcats' credit, they staved off match point six times until Markenzie Benoit put the match away with an emphatic kill to give Tulane the win 25-21.

"We got postseason win number one under our belt in match 32 of the year and now we're focused on the next one," Barnes said.

Tulane will be back in action Saturday at 4 p.m., taking on the winner of Colgate and Boston College at Cotterell Court in Hamilton with a chance to advance to the third round of the NIVC.

Follow Tulane volleyball on social media at @GreenWaveVB on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Follow Tulane Athletics on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram.

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