WKU Volleyball advances to the second round of the NCAA Tournament

No. 21 WKU Volleyball swept Coastal Carolina on Friday in the first round of the NCAA Tournament inside Thompson-Boling Arena for the program’s ninth NCAA victory. The Hilltoppers have now won at least one NCAA Volleyball Tournament match in five straight seasons.

“Both teams hit high clips tonight”, said head coach Travis Hudson. “Our experience in the Tournament helped early, but I told our team after the first set that that is not who you are going to see the rest of the match. We knew it was going to be much more of a struggle and have great respect for their [Coastal Carolina] program and what they’ve done this year.”

As WKU picked up its 30th win of the season, the Tops hit their highest hitting clip in a three-set match all season, .478, as they picked up seven aces from the line and a combo of six total aces from the net. Paige Briggs led the offensive charge with 18 kills off of a .531 hitting clip while Kaylee Cox, Logan Grevengoed, and Izzy Van De Wiele each stuffed three blocks in the front.

[6] WKU 3, Coastal Carolina 0: 25-14, 25-20, 25-23

Set 1
After a shot down the court from the team in teel, the Tops went on a 4-0 run carried out by kills from Izzy Van De Wiele, Logan Grevengoed, and a pair from Kaylee Cox. Both conference champion teams would rally out on the scoreboard as the Chants trailed behind. WKU would gain a six-point advantage on five-straight points featuring back-to-back aces for senior Cameron Mosley. Dominating offensively and contributing to the .519 set hitting clip as a team, ran on six points straight kicked off from a setter dump from Callie Bauer before Van De Wiele picked up a pair of kills and Briggs shot two off of defenders’ fingers. Coastal and WKU would trade serving the rest of the set, as the Chanticleers trailed by 11 and another setter dump from Bauer would cap off the frame.

Set 2
A 4-0 run with two Kaylee Cox aces would start off set two for the Red and White. CCU would battle back as both teams traded points on the board and Coastal Carolina bounced back on a 3-0 drive to tie the set at seven apiece. Back-and-forth on the court, and the Chants would take their first lead from back-to-back kills from Jalyn Stout and Lauren Malone. The Tops would edge them by one after shots from Cox and Briggs, but Coastal Carolina would pick up a 4-0 drive ending on a service ace to take a stronger lead. The Chants and Hilltoppers would battle back-and-forth until Kaylee Cox would kill off three in a row for the Red and White to fight back for the lead. As the set was tied at 20 points each, WKU ran out the rest of the frame five-straight off of three Paige Briggs shots from the left.

Set 3
A gritty battle at the beginning, WKU and CCU stayed even-keeled and rallied in 11 set ties until the 15th point. In the back-and-forth rallies, the Tops picked up 13 kills, two blocks, and a service ace from Kaylee Cox to open the frame. The Red and White ran on a 4-1 drive to bring the advantage to three points on the board. The Chanticleers picked up momentum, a pair of kills from Stout and Jasmine Rivest would pull in four straight points for the Sun Belt Conference Champions, followed up by two more to force head coach Travis Hudson to burn a timeout. As the set was 23-21 in favor of CCU, back-to-back Coastal Carolina errors followed up by a block from Cox and Van De Wiele would bring about match point. Fifth-year All-American Paige Briggs would close out her fifth NCAA victory off a shot off the fingers to move onto the second round.