California Baptist University
Lee University (Tenn.)
SISTER ACT
11/29/2006 8:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
COLUMBIA, Mo. --- Verania and Angela Willis each posted strong individual perfomances, as the NAIA's 2-time defending champion California Baptist swept Lee (Tenn.), 30-18, 30-18, 30-27, to open pool play in the 2006 NAIA National Championships.
The Lancers, who will conclude pool play with a pair of matches tomorrow, improve to 29-7 on the season with the win over unseeded Lee (28-8), which finished the regular season ranked No. 17 in the NAIA.
The No. 4-seeded Lancers' third consecutive bid at an NAIA title continues tomorrow morning with a pool matchup against No. 25-rated and unseeded Cedarville (Ohio) at 11:15 a.m., and then take on No. 8-ranked and No. 7-seeded Albertson (Idaho) at 8:15 p.m. Both times are listed as Central standard.
"I liked the way we started out today," said California Baptist head coach Ryan McGuyre. "The girls came ready to play and we did what we do well. The challenge is going to be to sustain that success as we move through the tournament. If we can continue to play within our game and take the other 2 teams in our pool seriously, we should be in a good position to move on."
Verania Willis kicked off a 17-kill performance with 4 kills in the opening set, as the Lancers rallied to an early 6-2 advantage and built up a 24-12 lead following a block assist by Shi Fei and Angela Willis, the latter of whom ended with 9 kills, 4 blocks and a pair of aces.
Lindsey Seifken, who would end the match with 3 blocks--including 2 solo--squelched a Flames attack to end the opening set at 30-18.
The Lancers picked right up where they left off to start game 2, as a Verania Willis kill kicked off a 7-point flurry to put Lee behind 14-5. Angela Willis posted 2 kills in the rally, and followed up a Fei kill with one of her own that ended the second set with an identical score of 30-18.
Not wishing to burn out softly, the Flames built up a 10-5 lead in the third set, and led 13-9 following a kill by Gorana Maric, but the Lancers quickly rebounded to rip 4 scores in a row to tie the game at 13 apiece. From there, the score was tied at every point until Fei posted a kill to take the lead for good at 20-19.
Brittney Barton's second ace off the bench gave the Lancers a 22-19 lead, and Mical Bell came off the bench as well to notch her only assist of the match at 30-27.
