Volleyball Falls to Pacific and San Diego by Scores of 3-0

Saturday, September 5

San Diego, Calif.

1:30 PM

Dartmouth College

0-2

University of the Pacific

4-1

Team	1	2	3	Final F
Pacific	25	25	25	3
Dartmouth	20	18	18	0

Team	1	2	3	Final F
Dartmouth	14	22	22	0
San Diego	25	25	25	3

Volleyball Falls to Pacific and San Diego by Scores of 3-0

9/5/2015 7:42:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score 1 Box Score 2

By: Dartmouth

SAN DIEGO, Calif. – After opening its season on Friday night against TCU, the Dartmouth volleyball team returned for the second day of the SDSU/USD Invitational with a 3-0 loss to Pacific (25-20, 25-18, 25-18) and No. 23 San Diego (25-14, 25-22, 25-22) at the Toreros' Jenny Craig Pavilion on Saturday.

At the end of the weekend, freshman Zoe Leonard was named to the All-Tournament Team.

The Big Green dipped to 0-3 with the losses. Pacific improved to 4-1 and host San Diego is now 5-1 on the year.

“I was so proud of how the team competed all day today,” head coach Erin Lindsey said. “We got better in every match we played this tournament. San Diego is a great team and we competed hard and really did a nice job getting into some defensive rhythm. We still need to work on executing and finishing, but I think it was productive to play this level of competition and we really rose to the occasion.

“If we can continue to train and compete at this level, we will start to see more wins,” Lindsey continued. “Our floor defense was really good at times, but we still have work to do on our blocking. I am most proud of how the team came together and put forth such a strong effort considering we are only two weeks in.”

In the first match of the day against the Tigers, senior Paige Caridi and junior Emily Astarita led the team with seven kills apiece, while fellow junior Stacey Benton had 25 assists. For the second match in a row, Leonard was first among the Big Green with 10 digs.

The first set was a close, physical battle and, after Dartmouth won the first point off a kill by senior Allison Brady, the teams went on to tie the score on 12 different occasions. Locked at 18, the Tigers went on a five-point run and, while Dartmouth was able to get two points closer off a pair of Pacific errors, a Tiger kill swiftly ended the set with a score of 25-20.

Although the second set started off in the opponent's favor, Dartmouth's first three points of the second set were won due to errors committed on the other side of the net and, with two kills by junior Molly Kornfeind, the Big Green were only trailing by four (10-6). Following consecutive kills by Kornfeind and senior Kaira Lujan, Pacific was just two points ahead (14-12). From there, the Tigers went on a handful of unanswered runs to claim the second.

A Caridi kill started the third set, but five straight points for the Tigers gave the Green's rival an early lead that would last until the end of the match. Junior Danielle Glinka had a strong performance in the final set, producing six of the team's 11 kills.

Later on in the day against the host Toreros, Caridi led with 10 kills, Leonard had 13 digs and Benton had 22 assists.

The first set was a bit of a challenge, as San Diego scored five straight at the end to swiftly take the win, but the second set was incredibly close. The Toreros struck first and ran with that lead, but the Big Green managed to catch up in no time and the two teams were tied five times throughout the set. With a score of 20-20, the hosts got two points ahead off two kills, only to have Dartmouth get back within one (22-21) following a Lujan kill.

The Green managed to hold the Toreros at match point while they took advantage of an error and added another kill to make the score 24-22, but a kill on the other side of the net wrapped things up.

Benton's service ace gave Dartmouth the first point of the third set and, much like the previous set, the two teams battled back and forth the entire time, fighting through eight ties in all. The Green took their first lead of the match off kills by Caridi and Astarita (12-10), but the Toreros soon tied things up again.

With a score of 20-20, San Diego got within one point of a victory off a pair of kills and errors, but a kill by Brady and a Leonard ace put the score at 24-22 and within reach for Dartmouth. A well-timed kill by the Toreros ended the match.

Next weekend, the Big Green will host the Dartmouth Tournament, hosting WVU on Friday, Sept. 11 and UConn on Sunday. The two visiting teams will face each other on Saturday.