Another weekend marks another split in Pac-12 play for the WSU volleyball team, falling 3-1 (22-25, 25-15, 25-23, 25-16) to Utah Friday and sweeping Colorado 3-0 (25-23,25-23, 25-12) Saturday.
After taking the first set on Friday from Utah, the Cougars dropped three straight sets after failing to adjust to some of the Utes'strengths.
"I thought Rachel (Todorovich) played well but we couldn't get a lot going offensively," WSU Head Coach Jen Greeny said in a press release. "Utah did a fantastic job at the net with 14 blocks and without our passing we couldn't move our offense around.”
Todorovich led the way for the Cougars against Utah, combining with Meagan Ganzer for 27 kills. Todorovich also contributed 11 digs and a .306 hitting percentage.
“I don’t think we prepared as well as we should’ve,” Todorovich said. “We came out a little bit on our heels in a lot of the sets. We were all waiting for someone else to respond and looking to each other, but things didn’t come together as we expected.”
The blocking ability of Utah up front was worked around in the first set by WSU but eventually caught up to the team in subsequent sets.
“In their previous games they’ve been a solid blocking team,” Todorovich said. “They’re a good team and we have to give them that respect. We also need to add that coverage in on our side, so our hitters can trust the back row players, just trust each other to do our jobs.”
After dropping the match to Utah the Cougars came back strong on Saturday, sweeping Colorado 3-0 while wearing their all-pink uniforms.
"We told the players they needed to play (tonight) as if they had nothing to lose,"Greeny said."Whether it was outward or inward pressure last night during the Utah match, I didn't think our players handled that pressure very well. Tonight we wanted to not worry about winning or losing but worry about one point at a time. The first two sets were tight and Colorado did a great job of digging some balls but I'm proud of the way we fought back and definitely responded in set three."
Proving herself a force once again, Ganzer led the Cougs against Colorado with 19 kills, a .375 hitting percentage, three service aces and two blocks.
"I thought our passing was good and therefore we could be in system,"Greeny said in a press release."Ganzer again had a great night and that was great for her because she struggled a little last night. We were able to get our middles going and I thought Chelsey Bettinson did a good job of coming in and being a force."
Next up for WSU will be a trip to California to take on Stanford and University of California, Berkeley, on Friday the and Saturday. Both games will be played at 7 p.m.
