IRVINE, Calif. - The road has not been kind to the No. 24 Point Loma volleyball team early this season and that trend continued Thursday night (Sept. 24) when PLNU dropped its PacWest road opener at Concordia (CA) 25-21, 14-25, 25-23 and 25-18.
With the loss Point Loma falls to 6-4 on the season (1-1 PacWest). All four losses have come on the road. The victory was the first PacWest victory ever for Concordia (4-7, 1-2 PacWest), which joined the conference as an active member prior to this season.
After falling in the first set, PLNU looked like they were going to take control of the match as they posted a convincing 25-14 win in the second set to the even the match at 1-1. The Sea Lions held CUI to just five kills and a -.094 hitting percentage in the set while posting a .212 hitting percentage of their own. This would be the last time PLNU outhit CUI in a set. The Eagles turned the tides on PLNU in the third set outhitting them by almost .200 percent (.247 to .057) and did the same in the fourth (.324 to .125) to defeat the Sea Lions.
"Concordia has been a volleyball powerhouse for years," PLNU head coach
Jonathan Scott said. "They beat us tonight. They put a ton of pressure on us, and we simply did not respond."
Marissa Hageman had a great match for PLNU in the losing effort. She matched her career-high for kills with nine and registered a career-best .471 hitting percentage.
Heather Leavitt paced Point Loma with 14 kills and narrowly missed a double-double with nine digs for the Sea Lions.
Christin Fisher led PLNU with 16 digs and
Kelli LeClair added 10 digs.
Savannah Wedemeyer had 42 assists.
Rachel Flynn had a match-best 16 kills to lead Concordia. Hannah Andrews chipped in with another 14 kills for the Eagles and Taylor Dennison had 25 digs.
Point Loma will now prepare to face PacWest preseason favorites California Baptist on the road on Saturday, Sept. 26 at 7:00 p.m. Following that match PLNU will return home to host Azusa Pacific as part of #BeatAPU week on Wednesday, Sept. 30 at 7:00 p.m.
