BATON ROUGE – Desiree Elliott and Michele Williams provided 12 apiece, but Kentucky used a blistering .385 team hitting percentage to claim a 3-0 sweep [24-26, 16-25, 17-25] over the LSU volleyball team Sunday at the Maravich Center.
The Wildcats (14-3, 5-1 SEC) defeated LSU (10-5, 3-2 SEC) for the seventh time in the last eight series meetings going back to the 2008 season. UK, who was receiving votes in the latest edition of the AVCA Top 25 poll, also handed the Tigers back-to-back home setbacks for the first time since 2004.
Williams smacked her 12 kills on a .348 hitting clip whereas Elliott reached double figure spikes for the 11th consecutive outing. Madie Jones popped eight kills and had her run of seven straight matches with 10 or more kills come to a close.
Defensively, Meghan Mannari and Malorie Pardo garnered eight digs each. The .385 hitting ratio for Kentucky was an opponent-high this season.
“You have to credit Kentucky, they controlled every aspect of the match,” head coach Fran Flory said. “We didn’t respond very well. They came at us very hard, and we didn’t have an answer. Our defense and our ball control has really led us and created opportunities. For the first time all year, that failed us. I’m really not sure why, but we’ll have to get back in the gym and figure out how to fix that. I’m very disappointed in that. But on the other side, Kentucky was very physical, and we didn’t answer the call.”
Christine Hartmann dished out 41 assists to go along with six kills on eight swings. She fueled the Wildcats to over a .300 hitting ratio during all three frames.
Lauren O’Conner hammered home a match-high 13 kills on a career-best .545 hitting percentage and added three blocks, while Ashley Frazier tacked on 10 kills for the Wildcats.
UK’s middles were solid Becky Pavan and Whitney Billings combined for 14 kills and 12 blocks. On the back row, Stephanie Klefot stretched out for a match-best 13 digs. The Tigers lost the sideout battle for the second straight match as Kentucky posted a 77 percent clip (45-for-58) compared to LSU’s 58 percent ratio (44-for-75).
The first set featured 13 ties and three lead changes. At 15-15, the Wildcats strung together eight of the next 12 points to build a 23-19 advantage. During the spurt, Kentucky used two O’Conner and two Frazier kills. The Tigers dug deep and fired back with a 4-1 run of their own. Nicole Willis powered home back-to-back spikes to jumpstart the rally, while an Elliott-Pardo block on Frazier knotted the score at 24-24. Frazier bounced right back and Ann Armes ended a long rally to vault UK to a 26-24 win.
“We fought back really hard. I thought we had a chance to pull it out at 24-24, but we just could not get what needed to get over the hump,” Flory said. “We left a couple of touches and a couple of plays out there. We didn’t manage some plays as well as we needed to. It’s disappointing, and we’ve preached that for a long time. In the last few weeks, we’ve done a great job of fixing that. There’s no doubt that we have to improve from here.”
The Wildcats used that momentum to race out to 10-4 edge to start the second stanza. LSU would cut the six-point hole in half on three occasions, the latest at 14-11, but UK rode O’Conner’s right arm to five spikes in the frame. The Wildcats totaled a match-best .433 hitting percentage in the set and emerged with a 25-16 victory.
Kentucky completed the sweep by a 25-17 margin during the third set. Six different Wildcats came away with multiple kills and UK’s defense forced the Tigers into seven hitting miscues and a match-low .062 hitting clip.
“I think that we’re probably going to come in and work very hard on everything in practice this week,” Williams said. “Hopefully, we’ll get better at working as a team and working on selflessness. We need to come together and bring it together. We want to win next time out.”
LSU returns to the road Friday and continues its run of five straight SEC Eastern Division matches at South Carolina. First serve is set for 6 p.m. CT at USC’s Volleyball Competition Facility.
Live audio and live stats are offered for free through the Geaux Zone on LSUsports.net. In-match updates also are available via the program’s social media outlets at http://twitter.com/lsuvolleyball or LSU Volleyball on Facebook.
Volleyball Postmatch Quotes
LSU vs. Kentucky – October 2, 2011
HEAD COACH FRAN FLORY
On Kentucky’s Offense…
“You have to credit Kentucky. They controlled every aspect of the match. We didn’t respond very well. They came at us very hard, and we didn’t have an answer. Our defense and our ball control has really led us and created opportunities. For the first time all year, that failed us. I’m really not sure why, but we’ll have to get back in the gym and figure out how to fix that. I’m very disappointed in that. But on the other side, Kentucky was very physical, and we didn’t answer the call.”
On Becky Pavan’s performance …
“(Becky) Pavan, we didn’t have an answer for her. She was outreaching us and is a little longer than us. We had a game plan, but we couldn’t get our players to execute it.”
On LSU’s effort…
“We weren’t mentally dialed in to be ahead of the play. Speed and ball control are the areas that we hang our hat on, but today speed and ball control were on the other side of the net with Kentucky. When you have that, you’re not going to win the match.”
On the tight first set…
“We fought back really hard. I thought we had a chance to pull it out at 24-24, but we just could not get what needed to get over the hump. We left a couple of touches and a couple of plays out there. We didn’t manage some plays as well as we needed to. It’s disappointing, and we’ve preached that for a long time. You can’t leave touches. You can’t leave opportunities out there. In the last few weeks, we’ve done a great job of fixing that. Today, we didn’t have it in us. I don’t know if we just didn’t recover from a tough match Friday against Tennessee. We’re a little young, we’re going to chat about it. There’s no doubt that we have to improve from here.”
On future SEC matches…
“Every SEC team is capable of beating everybody else for the first time in a long time. This weekend, with Kentucky and Tennessee, they’re certainly in the top three teams along with Florida. The rest of us, you could throw us in a hat and pick out one. Anybody can beat anybody. So, it’s going to be an adventure for the rest of the season for every other team in the SEC. Our young team has to understand that there are no off matches. We have to come ready to play every time we take the court.”
MIDDLE BLOCKER MICHELLE WILLIAMS
On Kentucky’s Offense Success…
“I think they took care of the really easy plays. When we got out there, we weren’t taking care of easy plays. We need to do a better job of focusing on that more in matches.”
On the tight first set…
“I think that when a team does that [comes back in the first set but loses], it should spark a fire. Today, we just didn’t answer any of the calls out there on the court. I think it did take [the air] out of us a bit.”
On making improvements for future matches…
“I think that we’re probably going to come in and work very hard on everything in practice this week. Hopefully, we’ll get better at working as a team and working on selflessness. We need to come together and bring it together. We want to win next time out.”