On March 17, the Saint Xavier volleyball team battled Calumet College of St. Joesph on Bob Hallberg Court. The Cougars dominated this matchup and continued their winning ways.
Before the game even started, senior middle blocker Sam Kull was recognized before the game on “Senior/Parent Night” as he was the only senior on the team. Also, the rest of the players and their parents were recognized as well.
This undoubtedly would fire up the players before their game. The players started out the game on fire after they and their parents were honored, scoring four of the first five points to take a 4-1 lead in the first set.
After closing their gap to 4-3, the Cougars would go on a 14-4 run to extend their lead to 18-7. From there, these teams would trade points with each other resulting in a 21-12 lead.
At this point, the Cougars put this game away by scoring four out of the next six points to win the first set 25-14 and to take a 1-0 game lead. The second set started out like the first set, with Saint Xavier jumping out to an early lead of 7-2.
But Calumet would come back, going on a 9-3 run to take the lead at 11-10. The Cougars would respond by going on a 7-1 run to retake the lead at 17-12. Runs continued to be the theme of this set, as Calumet would score four of the next five points to cut their deficit to 18-16.
But the Cougars would not allow their opponents to get any closer, going on a 7-2 run to win the set 25-18 and to take a commanding 2-0 game lead on their home court. Determined to put this game away in this set, the Cougars came out on fire.
After finding themselves down 2-1, Saint Xavier would go on a 14-2 run to take the lead at 15-4. After Calumet scored two straight points to close the gap to 15-6. The Cougars went on a 6-1 run to go up 21-7.
From here, these teams would trade points the rest of the way, resulting in a 25-11 set win for Saint Xavier and a clean sweep of Calumet College at 3-0. Kull had a great game on “Senior/Parent Night”, recording game-highs of 18 kills and three total blocks.
Outside hitter Sean Barry also had a good game, recording eight kills. Setter Moises Lopez led the team with 21 assists. Outside hitter Dan O’Keefe led the Cougars with three aces. Libero Dominic Villa had a strong defensive game with eight digs.
The Cougars were led by their offense in this game totaling 40 kills and committing only 11 attack errors, resulting in a whopping team attack percentage of 36.3%.
The win was the Cougars’ fifth in their last seven games. The win pushes the Cougars’ overall record to 10-13 and their conference record to 7-5.
On March 20, the Saint Xavier volleyball team took on Cardinal Stritch University. The Cougars had a rough game against their conference foe and really could not get their offense going in this one.
The first set started out well for the Cougars as they jumped out to a 4-2 lead. From there, these teams would exchange points for a long period of time. This exchange would result in Saint Xavier holding a 9-7 lead over Cardinal Stritch.
But the Wolves would go on a massive 14-5 run to take a commanding 21-14 lead. From there, these teams would exchange points with each other for the rest of the set. Cardinal Stritch would go on to win this set 25-18 and take a 1-0 game lead.
After winning the first set, the Wolves carried that momentum into the second set, starting the set by scoring five out of the first six points to take a 5-1 lead. But the Cougars would fight back, scoring four straight points to tie the game at 5-5.
Once again though, the Wolves would go on another 5-1 run to retake the lead at 10-6. After scoring two straight points to cut the deficit to 10-8, the Cougars found themselves on the wrong side of an 8-0 run which pushed Cardinal Stritch’s lead to 16-8.
The Cougars would once again try to get back into the game, scoring two straight points to make the Wolves’ lead 16-10. But again the opposition would go on a run, only this time the run would put the Cougars away, scoring nine of the next 12 points to win the set 25-13 and take a commanding 2-0 game lead.
Just like the beginning of the second set, the Wolves would use the momentum that they gained from winning the previous set to start the third set on a roll, scoring 10 of the first 15 points to gain a 10-5 lead on the home team.
But the Cougars showed their grit, going on an 8-3 run to tie the game at 13-13. But Cardinal Stritch would answer that run with a 4-1 run to retake the lead at 17-14. The Cougars did not give up though, going on another 4-1 run to re-tie the game at 18-18.
With the game tied, Cardinal Stritch would show their killer instinct, scoring seven of the next 10 points to put the home team away for good by winning the set 25-21 and sweeping Saint Xavier 3-0.
Outside hitter Sean Barry led the way for the Cougars with eight kills and three aces. Setter Justin Parra led the team in assists with nine. Libero Dominic Villa had another strong defensive performance, leading the team in dogs with nine while also recording three assists.
Middle blocker Sam Kull had an off night, recording only five kills. As you can tell by the key stats of the Saint Xavier players, the Cougars’ offense was abysmal in this game.
As a team, the Cougars had only 20 kills and committed 19 attack errors for a putrid attack percentage of 1.2%. With the loss, the Cougars record now stands at 10-14 with a conference record of 7-6.
The final game of the regular season is on March 24, at home against conference foe Trinity International University at 7 PM. Unfortunately, we will not have the results at press time.
John Romando
Senior Sports Editor
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