GREENEVILLE, Tenn. --- Tusculum College earned a 3-0 sweep of Newberry College in a South Atlantic Conference women's volleyball match Saturday afternoon at Pioneer Arena. Set scores were 25-19, 25-19 and 25-14.
Sarah Bouley led the Pioneers (12-16, 7-13 SAC) with 15 kills and Laryssa Welch hit .500 with 10 kills as Tusculum snapped a four-match losing streak with the sweep of the Wolves (17-11, 14-6 SAC). The Pioneers hit .279 as a team in the match and bolstered those numbers with 10 service aces and seven blocks against the Wolves, who hit just .160 as a team and never led by more than one point in any of the three sets.
Hallie Zumack and Shannon Murphy shared the team high with 18 assists for the Pioneers, while Cassie Born and Megan Yopko had 14 digs apiece. Born also had four aces while Welch, Garnett and Mariah Lewis had three blocks apiece.
Logan Hayward had a team-high 15 kills for Newberry, but she was the lone player to reach double figures for the Wolves who had just 32 kills as a team in the match. Maggie Marsh dished out 24 assists for the Wolves, while Kensley Jordan had a team-best 13 digs.
In the first set, neither team led by more than one point until the Pioneers went on top 13-11 on an ace from Murphy. Newberry came back to knot the score at 14-14, 15-15 and 16-16, but a kill from Garnett gave the Pioneers the lead for good at 17-16. Welch had five kills in six attacks for the Pioneers in the set, while Bouley had four kills and Born added six digs. Hayward led the Wolves with eight kills in the opening set.
In the second set, Tusculum jumped out to a 5-1 lead thanks to back-to-back aces from Born, but Newberry came back to tie the score at 6-6 on a kill by Madison Darby-McClure. The Pioneers then had separate runs of four points on Bouley's serve and five points on Yopko's serve to go ahead 17-8 in the set. Bouley led the Pioneers with five kills in the set, with Yopko contributing six digs.
The third set saw the Pioneers in control from the opening point, as Tusculum took a 3-0 lead and built it to 9-2 on two kills by Bouley and one from Garnett. The Pioneers continued to extend their advantage, going ahead 14-7 on a kill by Welch and 18-9 on a Bouley kill. A kill by Garnett set up match point, which went to the Pioneers on a hitting error by the Wolves. Tusculum hit .368 in the set (17 kills in 38 attacks) with Bouley recorded six kills and five by Garnett on six attacks.
Tusculum will wrap up the regular season with a pair of road matches next weekend, beginning Friday night at Coker at 7 p.m. and concluding Saturday at Wingate for a 2 p.m. match.
