Volleyball team comes back from two game deficit to win a thrilling game versus rival pacific Lutheran

The test of the season came for the Loggers on Wednesday, Oct. 26 against cross-town rivals Pacific Lutheran University (PLU).  The Loggers took the match and tied first place in the Northwest Conference (NWC) with a tight five set win over the PLU Lutes.  The Loggers, previously ranked 15th in the NCAA poll, are now battling on even ground with PLU for the lead in the NWC.

The first game of the match looked to set the tone for the rest of the night with a total of ten tied scores and six lead changes.  The Loggers looked to grind the Lutes out of the first game, if it weren’t for an untimely service error that gave the Lutes the confidence they needed to close the first game at 25-21.

PLU looked to capitalize on the hard-fought first game with a win in the second and did just that as they came bursting out of the gates to a 6-3 lead.  The Loggers looked to stabilize, closing within one point of the Lutes at 12-11, but the Lutes were determined to hold their lead and rattled off a 9-1 run to put themselves firmly in the lead at 21-12.  The Loggers showed some fight, holding off the Lutes for a few more points before the Lutes were able to close the game out at 25-14.

With their backs against the wall, the Loggers needed a win in the third game to make a fist of this match.  The third game looked to be a repeat of the first game, with teams trading points up to 11 a piece.  The Loggers began to grind ahead of their NWC rivals by taking two points in a row with impressive kills from two seniors, number five Jackie Harvey (Santa Barbara, Calif.) and number nine Jordan Bird (Richland, Wash.).  The Loggers never looked back in game three and rolled off five points in a row to take a commanding 23-16 lead.  The Loggers closed out a much needed game three with another kill from Harvey and an attacking error by the Lutes.

The Loggers looked to be in trouble for the final time when they trailed PLU 23-19 late in the fourth game of the match.  The Loggers began to crawl back into the game with a venomous kill from senior number six Jenni Brehove (Vista, Calif.).  The Loggers took advantage of the window given to them by the Lutes with two more kills from Harvey and one from Brehove.  Brehove also served up two services aces in concert with two Lute errors to take the fourth game.

The Lutes actually looked resurgent in the final game, rolling out easily to leads at 4-1 and 8-4.  The Loggers weren’t going down without a fight and battled back with a 5-0 run to take the lead at 9-8.  The Lutes looked to slow the bleeding with a timeout, and it seemed to work at first when they earned a kill to bring the match to a tie at nine a piece.  The Loggers weren’t having any of it, taking a 4-1 run with kills from Harvey, Brehove and sophomore number 19 Emily Convery (Portland, Ore.).  Junior number eight Jalene Toy looked to put the final nail in the coffin with a service ace, but the Lutes weren’t going down without a fight, battling back to a two point deficit at 13-11.  The Loggers, however, put an end to the festivities once and for all as Harvey notched the final two kills of the match to seal it for the Loggers.

Superb blocking was a theme in the Loggers’ win, as there were a total of 13 blocks and 24 assists from Puget Sound that night.  Featured amongst the blockers were Convery with six assists and junior number 14 Nicolette Reynaud (Los Gatos, Calif.) with five.

Harvey looked in dire straits in the early games of the match but was a large reason why the Loggers pulled through the five set ordeal.  She had an impressive five of the Loggers’ 11 kills in the final game.  Harvey’s last kill gave her a total of 17 that day and reached the landmark of 1,000 kills in her career.  Since the change in the volleyball scoring system in 2001, no Logger had notched 1,000 career kills and digs.  Harvey became the first Logger to do so as she notched her 1,000th dig against George Fox and her 1,000th kill on Wednesday.

Harvey led the charge for the Loggers with her 17 kills, and fellow senior number ten Marissa Florant (Palo Alto, Calif.) came in a close second with 15 kills.  Senior number one Christina Chun (Pearl City, Hawaii) led the Loggers in digs with a solid 26.  Brehove also had an impressive statistic, leading the home team in assists with 48.

The mid-week win puts the Loggers at eight victories in a row, at the same time handing PLU their first loss of the conference season.  The next two tests for the Loggers were Friday, Oct. 25 at home against Lewis and Clark at 7:00 p.m., and Saturday, Oct. 26 at home against Willamette at 7:00 p.m.