Box Score NASHVILLE, Tenn.—Belmont beat Jacksonville 3-0 to move to 4-2 in conference play and 10-13 on the season. The win was the second straight for the Belmont and only the second time this season the Bruins have recorded back-to-back wins. Belmont will have a chance to try and make it a three game win streak when they face North Florida tomorrow afternoon for Senior Day.
"It was a really good win," said Head Coach Deane Webb. "That was a good team and a very, very physical team. We knew that we were going to have to really control the match on first ball contact and I think we were able to do that tonight. We were able to get them out of system. I was very pleased with how aggressive we were from the service line and really pleased with our emotional energy, emotional stability, not getting rattled. There were opportunities in game three to get rattled and we didn't. We just focused and raised our game and came out with the victory."
Belmont battled back in the third set to complete the sweep, showing their growth from earlier matches this season where the team sometimes struggled to close out matches.
"I credit our team for growing and maturing," Webb said. "For going through the challenges that are inherent to any season. Every season's challenges are different, but every season does have its own set of challenges and this year we struggled at different times with different things. Tonight I saw a lot of maturity on the court. I saw a great deal of composure. I credit our upperclassmen, credit our seniors for being leaders and putting us in position to have that growth. I thought Tara was very stable out there tonight. Obviously Kayla (Albritton) and Maggie (Johnson) offensively put up some big numbers. I'm just really pleased overall with a very solid and stable performance tonight."
The Bruins were led again by senior Kayla Albritton (Gainesville, Fla.) with 15 kills. Albritton also added a service ace. Freshman Jen Myer led the team with three service aces while fellow freshman Hannah Miranda added two. Miranda also led the Belmont with 37 assists. Junior Maggie Johnson also had a solid offensive night with 10 kills, while senior Tara Blood had seven kills to go along with a team high four blocks. Senior libero Megan Clements led the team with 12 digs. Clements spearheaded a strong defensive effort from the Bruins, who held Jacksonville to a .000 hitting percentage in set two.
"I think Megan really dug a great deal of hard driven balls tonight that were just rally extending type plays that very easily could have ended rallies on some very good swings from the other side of the net. Allyia (Drzewiecki) had some balls hit with a lot of pace," Webb said of the team's defense. "Megan did a nice job of lining up, getting us not just balls, but balls we could turn around and transition on. She dug some pretty tough balls tonight and I think that was the key to leading the rest of our team defensively. We had some other kids that were flying around. If you look all the way across (the box score), a number of people made some defensive plays. Whenever we made the change and put Kayla on the outside, that was a benefit we didn't really expect, but just really moving Jen Myer back on the right side and playing the right back defense, she's a special defender and that gets her in position to probably defend more balls than she did when was playing middle back. I think that has been a big plus for us."
Belmont and Jacksonville were picked to finish third and fourth by league coaches in the annual preseason poll. The teams came into the match fifth and sixth in the most recent conference standings, with only one game separating them. The win helped Belmont create some distance between itself and Jacksonville, which could be important as the conference season winds down and tournament seeds are assigned. The win was the fifth straight over Jacksonville.
Tomorrow's match against North Florida marks the final home game of the season and the final home appearance for Belmont's five seniors. Carly Frazier, Megan Clements, Kayla Albritton, Tara Blood and Ester Mellado will be honored before the match. First serve is set for 2 p.m. in the Curb Event Center.
"I could give you a lot of quotes and fill up a lot pages with quotes and my feelings and my thoughts about this group of players," Webb said of his seniors. "To see how far they've come as a group, looking across this entire group, there's maybe not a single player in that group who was just an unbelievable player when they got here. I look at where they are now and I think back to all the hard work that they've put in to make that happen. These aren't kids who just magically happened, they put in a great deal of work to make it happen. Anytime you have kids like that come through your program, that work that hard and also work that hard in the classroom, they're just a very, very special group. They're group of players, but they're an even better group of people."
