Volleyball loses five-setter at Mobile

MOBILE, Ala. – The Loyola University New Orleans volleyball team took Mobile to the brink on Saturday, but the Rams pulled out the five-set victory after claiming the final two games of the match. Loyola (7-5 in SSAC) is still within striking distance of second place in the league standings, trailing William Carey (7-4) and Blue Mountain Christian (8-4) with one game left on the schedule. 
 

On Saturday, Nov. 9, the Wolf Pack will travel to Hattiesburg, Mississippi, for the regular-season finale against William Carey at 2 p.m.
 

The Rams began with an early lead in the first set, 3-1, but kills by Clarissa Dupree and Alexa Palmer and two Mobile errors put the Pack in front, 5-3. Not long after, the Rams went on a scoring run, taking a lead over the Wolf Pack, and winning the first set over Loyola, 25-20.
 

After Mobile got a 16-10 lead to start set two, the Pack scored six straight points with a kill by Palmer, a block by Natalie Burkholder and Preslie Boswell, along with an ace from Ellie Connor, to tie the score, 16-16. After both teams traded points to tie the match at 19-all, the Wolf Pack pulled away with a kill from Boswell and two more kills by Palmer and Amaya Bazemore, each assisted by Belén Puche Laguna, 22-19. After two Mobile points put the score within one, Bazemore and Palmer found the floor to help Loyola secure the second set.
 

Once Mobile grabbed a 6-5 lead, Boswell and Ellie Connor got kills and an ace by Kala Emanuelli helped Loyola score five of the next six points to take a 10-7 lead. Shortly after, Mobile scored three to tie the score for the fifth time in the third set, 10-10. Loyola proceeded to win six of the next seven points to take a five-point lead, 16-11. During that stretch, Juliana Pacini found the floor and Bazemore added another kill to her total just after combining for a block with Palmer. 
 

The Pack stayed ahead for the rest of the third set, getting Loyola's largest lead of the set with another kill by Boswell, 22-15. Once Mobile got the score within four, 22-18, Bazemore notched her 12th and 13th kills of the match and Dupree sealed the third-set victory with another kill, 25-18.=
 

Mobile started the fourth set off by taking a 6-0 lead. Loyola, though, scored five points with the help of a Bazemore kill, getting the set score within one, 6-5. The Rams kept on scoring after that, extending the lead to five, 10-5. The home team made it difficult for the Wolf Pack to catch up, holding the lead for the rest of set four to force a tie-breaking fifth set, 25-15.
 

The Rams struck first in the fifth set, taking a slight lead, 7-5. In the following points, both teams traded scores with Boswell finding the floor twice, along with Dupree getting her fourth kill of the match and putting the Wolf Pack within one, 9-8. The Rams managed to pull away in the following points, forcing a match point, 14-9. Bazemore found the floor, once again, to put the Pack within four, but the Rams scored the final point to take the conference contest, 15-10.
 

Wolf Pack Head Coach Jesse Zabal

"It's tough to not come out of that much frustrated with the loss, but there was so much good that came out of it. We're a completely different team since the last time we played Mobile and we just have to keep focusing on fine tuning the small things and maintaining consistency. Mobile served very tough and handled a few more chaos plays better than us. If you look at the comparative stats, it's almost completely even across the board, it was that close. We hope the team walks out of this with the confidence and excitement/anticipation of seeing Mobile again in the conference tournament. 

"Preslie has really turned it on here in the last half of the season and had another strong match today. Amaya hit another career high in kills and continues to be a force for us. Overall, we're very proud of the work and effort this group has put in to keep us moving on an upward trajectory." 
 

Pack Facts

• Amaya Bazemore turned in another career performance on Saturday. In her third consecutive match notching at least 15 kills, Bazemore finished with a career-high 19 kills and 5 blocks while hitting .531 for the match. 

• Simone Moreau recorded a match-high 30 digs on Saturday, her second time reaching the 30-dig mark in the last three matches. She also became the fifth Wolf Pack player to reach 1,800 digs in her career at Loyola.

• Belén Puche Laguna tied her season high with 23 assists, while Ellie Connor had 17 assists plus a pair of aces. 

• Preslie Boswell was second on the team with 12 kills, her most in a match since August. 

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