Dartmouth Women's Volleyball Wins its Final Two Matches at NC State Tournament

Saturday, September 8

Raleigh, N.C.

12:00 p.m.

Dartmouth College

NC State

Dartmouth Women's Volleyball Wins its Final Two Matches at NC State Tournament

9/8/2007 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball

By: Dartmouth

NC State Boxscore

East Carolina Boxscore

RALEIGH, N.C. ? The Dartmouth (2-1) women's volleyball team won its final two games at the Holiday Inn Brownstone Volleyball Challenge on the NC State campus on Saturday. The Big Green defeated host NC State (30-17, 31-29, 28-30, 30-17) in four games before earning another victory over East Carolina (25-30, 30-24, 30-25, 30-27) in the nightcap.

Sophomore Morgan Covington (Katy, Texas) was named to the All-Tournament team.

Against The Pack the Big Green hit .132 compared to NC State's .065 as Dartmouth won its first game of the season. Jess Thomas (13), Morgan Covington (13) and Sandy Barbut (10) all hit the double-digit mark in kills for the Big Green.

"We really turned it on in the first two games," said head coach Ann Marie Larese."Morgan Covington was the difference for us our overall our hitting wasn't good but she had huge kills when we needed them."

The Big Green got off to a quick start, taking the first game 30-17 while making NC State hit just -.027. Both teams traded leads early on, but Dartmouth took over for good at 8-7 on a Covington kill. The Big Green then picked up 12 of the next 18 points, pushing its tilt to 20-13. State only got four more points from that point on before a handling error closed things out, 30-17.

Both offenses sputtered in the second contest, as the Wolfpack offered a .065 clip and the Big Green hit just .022. The red and white was out in front for the majority of play, but with the scored tied at 29-all, Dartmouth got the two points it needed to take a 2-0 match lead by winning 31-29.

The Big Green again came out of the blocks early in the third frame but the Wolfpack came back to tie things up at 12-12. Dartmouth responded by taking five of the next six points to reclaim a 17-13 advantage, but State cut it to 27-26 on a service ace and then tied things up at 27-27. Deadlocked at 28-28, Dartmouth committed two attack errors and the Pack forced a fourth game, 28-30.

The Big Green continued its trend of jumping out to an early lead by going up 4-1 in the final game but NC State notched three-straight points to tie the score. Dartmouth eventually regained control, forcing a State timeout at 16-9. When play resumed the Big Green grabbed four more in a row, giving the Wolfpack no choice but to take another break. Dartmouth kept up the pressure, winning 30-17.

In the nightcap the Big Green again had to go to four games before taking its second victory of the season. Thomas (Tampa, Fla.) led five Dartmouth players in kills with 17 while Covington had 10, Sandy Barbut (Los Angeles, Calif.) had 11 and freshman Kelsey Johnson (Carlsbad, Calif.) notched 16.

ECU just barely outhit Dartmouth. 214 to .201 while blocking was again huge as the Big Green recorded 19 total blocks.

"We really dug it out," Larese said. "Our blocking was outstanding and our serving was very, very good. These were two huge wins for our program and we are very excited to get home and take our momentum from this tournament into the rest of the season.

The Big Green travels back East, taking on Quinnipiac in Hamden, Connecticut on Monday at 7:00 pm.