@UNCBearsVB loses the first road game of the season at CSU

Tuesday, August 29

Fort Collins, Colo.

7pm

University of Northern Colorado

0-3

Colorado State University

2-1

Team	1	2	3	Final F
Northern Colorado	21	18	17	0
Colorado State	25	25	25	3

Photo by: Dean Popejoy

8/29/2017 11:36:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

The Bears first road trip ends in a sweep

By: Matthew Kushar, UNCBears.com

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – The 50^th season for Northern Colorado volleyball has gotten off to an rough start after the team was swept by Colorado State on Tuesday night.

UNC dropped to 0-3 on the season after the loss to CSU (2-1, 0-0 Mountain West). The team is 0-3 for the first time since 2007.

Northern Colorado started the game off well, taking an early 3-1 lead on CSU with kills from Kim Weissmann and Ryleigh Haynes. CSU responded with a 4-0 run to take a 5-4 lead and its front row began to assert itself along the net. The set stayed close with 12 ties and five lead changes. The Rams would win the first set 25-21 behind four kills from Kirstie Hillyer and a .346 attack percentage overall from the team. The Bears offense was productive with a .267 attack percentage and three kills each from Alex Kloehn, Kortney Lockey, and Kim Weissmann. Haynes facilitated the offense with nine assists.

The offense for the Bears struggled in the second set and the team suffered seven errors for a .148 attack percentage. Lockey added another three kills to keep UNC in the match, but the errors were too much for the team to overcome. The Bears were in a 0-2 hole after a 25-18 loss in the second set and CSU was in control of the match. Breana Runnels led the Rams with four kills in the set.

The third set saw CSU take the lead early and never relinquished it to complete the sweep of UNC with a 25-17 win. Hillyer led the charge for CSU in the third after a quite second set and recorded five kills. CSU had their best offensive set of the night with a .520 attack percentage, including 15 kills. Freshman Taylor Muff had a good set for the Bears with three kills. Sarah Wyland also played well in the third with two kills and two total attempts.

Serving Woes
UNC and CSU combined for 21 serving errors in that match and only eight serving aces. The Bears also struggled against Duke and UCF in this aspect of their game.

Reflection on the Match
"I like some of the things we did. I liked our aggressiveness. We were more aggressive at the net and attacked more. But there are things we need to fix moving forward. We don't have a lot of time to fix them. We only have one practice left at home before we fly out to and we will have one practice out there."-Head Coach, Lyndsey Oates

Next Up
Northern Colorado will fly to Fargo, N.D. for the second weekend of its season. The Bears will play three matches in the North Dakota State University Classic against, San Francisco (9/1), North Dakota State (9/1), and Florida A&M (9/2).