Sept. 15, 2007
Final Stats
LAS VEGAS - It was a history making weekend for the UNLV volleyball team as the squad improved to 10-1 overall and 2-0 in Mountain West Conference play. The Rebels defeated the Utah Utes (2-7, 0-2 MWC) by a 3-1 score (30-19, 25-30, 30-28, 30-25) Saturday afternoon. The win over Utah, combined with a victory over #12 BYU on Thursday night, was the first time that the Rebels defeated the pair in the same season for the first time in the program's history. This was also the first win by UNLV over Utah since 1998.
The 10-1 start is the best in program history and includes nine straight victories. The nine wins in-a-row rank as the second highest streak in the program's history and trails only the 1998 squad's 10 straight.
The Rebels out-hit the Utes .223 to .163 with the home squad holding the higher percentage in all games, but the second frame (Utah's win). The Rebels held the Utes to a under .100 in two of the games with a .067 in the first and .081 in the third. UNLV struck for .300 in the first and then stayed in the .100 to .200 range for the remainder of the contest. Utah hit for .311 in its lone win of the match.
After losing its last three contests, the Utes came out on fire by taking the first four points of game one. UNLV countered with six straight of its own to take a two-point lead at 6-4. Utah pulled within one at 6-5, but that was the closest they would get in the game. UNLV pushed its lead to 10 on three different occasions before taking the game by 11 at 30-19.
Game two was similar to the first, but in opposite fashion. The Utes managed to jump out to break a 7-7 tie and push ahead. The Rebels were able to cut the lead to three late in the game at the 27-24 and 28-25 marks, but watched as two of their own errors gave the Utes the final two points for the game.
The third game started off equally for both squads. After a 9-9 deadlock, the Utes ran off with nine of 13 points for a 18-13 lead. UNLV slowly began chipping away at its deficit and pulled within one at 21-20 before Utah called a timeout. The Rebels evened the score at 21-21 on the next point, but watched as the Utes built its lead back up to 27-25. A kill by Maria Aladjova and back-to-back errors by Utah's Kathryn Haynie gave the Rebels their first lead since the 1-0 mark of the stanza. After a Utah timeout, the Rebels kept the momentum alive by scoring two of the final three points (both off of kills by Jessica Walters) for the 30-28 win.
The fourth and final game turned out to be like game one. After a 2-2 tie, UNLV scored nine of the next 12 points for a 11-5 lead. From that point on UNLV never looked back and ran away with the game at 30-25.
UNLV was led offensively by double-doubles from Aladjova and Jessica Walters. Aladjova knocked down 18 kills and tallied 14 digs to Walters' 13 kills and 13 digs. Melody Nua fell one dig shy of a double-double with nine digs and a match-high 54 assists.
Besides helping out her attackers with assists, Nua knocked down some timely kills with six in the match for a .417 hitting percentage.
Lauren Miramontes tallied a match-high 20 kills for UNLV. Miramontes racked up the highest hitting percentage (.349) for any player in the match with over 10 kills. On the defensive side of the ball, she had five digs and four assisted blocks.
Defensively, the Rebels dug out 92 Utah attacks with Jada Walker leading the way with a match-high 29. Camille Cunningham was second on the Rebels with 15 digs.
Utah was led by double-doubles from Hainie (18 kills, 14 digs), Keisha Fisher (37 assists, 12 digs) and Kate Robison (12 kills, 17 digs). Fisher and Stephanie Shardlow split setting duties with Fisher assisting on a team-high 37 kills, to Shardlow's 23. Connie Dangerfield led the Utes in digs with 20.
The Rebels hit the road next weekend with a pair of matches in the state of California. UNLV plays a MWC match versus San Diego State on Sept. 21 at 7:00 pm and then follows that up with a non-conference tilt at #22 Santa Clara on the 23rd at 1:00 pm.
