Sept. 16, 2006

Box Score

HATTIESBURG, Miss. -- - The Southern Miss volleyball team capped off the weekend with a 3-2 victory over Troy on Saturday, improving 7-7 on the season while Troy dropped to 5-10.

Freshman Angela Hlavaty led Southern Miss with 15 kills with no attack errors and had an attack percentage of .500, while Amanda Huntoon added 10 kills. Mari Ruddick had nine kills with an attack percentage of .421. Maia Ivanova tallied 14 digs and Ashley Petrinec had 11 digs.

Liz Leeds led Troy with 18 kills followed by Aubre Smith with 13 and Meghan Gilroy with 12. Carla Rasuck recorded 20 digs and Meghan Washlow had 12 digs.

"The first two games we played great," Head Coach Ricci Luyties said. "We've been having trouble coming out slow in games after we win. That's thing we have to keep working on. We are trying to do different things preparing between games."

"I thought Hlavaty had a great game with 15 kills and no errors and some blocks," Luyties said. "She was fantastic for us. Cassie Lavery set a good match for us also. I thought she did a good job for us."

Southern Miss took the early lead and led by as many as 11 points on two occasions. The Lady Eagles out-hit Troy .324 to .184 to win game one, 30-20.

In game two, Southern Miss led from start to finish. The Lady Eagles recorded 15 kills on 30 attempts while committing only two attack errors. Southern Miss finished game two with four aces in the 30-18 win.

"We knew Troy would keep fighting because they are scrappy," Luyties said. "They touch a lot of balls and dink a lot of balls and we knew they wouldn't give up. They showed that they were a team you can't quite on."

Troy's Washlow served the first six points for the Trojans to start game three. Troy built an eight-point advantage before Southern Miss battled back and actually took the lead, 15-14. The Trojans regrouped and went on the win 30-22.

Troy basically dominated game four from start to finish, holding the Lady Eagles to 15 points. Southern Miss hit -.148, while Troy hit .429. Smith was responsible for serving 13 points, including three aces in the 30-15 win.

Both team battled back and forth in game five. With the score tied at 4-4, Southern Miss then scored four straight points, taking an 8-4 lead. Troy battled back to tie the game at 12-12, but the Lady Eagles got two kills from Stevi Cherry and Jean McCarthy ended the game with an attack error, giving Southern Miss the 15-12 win.

"Again I'm proud of our players for the way they came out in the fifth game after putting the third and fourth game behind us," Luyties said. "We were able to play well with the exception of the one little spurt."

Southern Miss returns to action when the Lady Eagles host UNO, Sept. 20, in the Payne Center. First serve is set for 7 p.m.