HAYWARD — Trailing two games to none, the Stanislaus State women's volleyball team rebounded in a huge way and rallied all the way back to edge Dominican, 3-2, in the Warriors' first match on Saturday at the Route 92 Showdown at Cal State East Bay.
Then, in the tournament finale match for the Warriors, they easily desposed Holy Names to complete a perfect weekend, starting the season 4-0 for the first sime since 2011.
In the win over Dominican,
Blair Ehrlich put-away 26 kills — just one shy of tying her career high set as a freshman on Oct. 25, 2013, to lead the Stanislaus attack.
Dominican (2-2) slipped by Stanislaus in the first two sets, but the Warriors dominated and rolled to wins in the third and fourth sets en route to a thrilling 26-28, 22-25, 25-16, 25-15, 15-12 victory. The final set was a see-saw battle with the Warriors leading by three points three times, including a set-point at 14-11. Teams traded attacking errors to finish the match 15-12.
Ehrlich was on fire early, spiking nine kills in the first set. She keyed the comeback in the third with eight of her kills as well. The busy outside hitter swung 83 times, which is a new Stanislaus single match record — shattering the previous mark of 72 set by Andrea Fett in November of 2012.
Taylor Massengale and
Paige Walker recorded 15 and 13 kills, respectively. Walker also led the team with 29 digs as the defense again played well.
Hailey Gruetzmacher had 22 digs and
Maddi Seidl picked up 20 digs to go with 53 assists.
Jocelyn Cervantes had 19 digs and seven kills to chip in.
In the late afternoon affair against Holy Names (0-4), the Warriors only needed 37 team kills to beat the Hawks, 25-17, 25-9, 25-12. 15 different Warriors all saw action on the court in this match with Massengale leading with nine kills. Ehrlich finished the day with seven more kills and
Clairissa Larry added six to the cause.