The Portland State women’s volleyball team had their perfect season halted by a sweep last week, but came back to win their second match for a split weekend. The Idaho State Bengals took the visiting Vikings in three to move to a tie for first place in conference standings. The Vikings turned their game around on Saturday and dominated in a sweep of the Weber State Wildcats.
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Vikings Volleyball focused on serving this weekend. They won one of two games.
“ISU is a very hard place to play at. It was hard to stick together and play as a team,” junior outside hitter Aubrey Mitchell said of the opening match. “They earned it. They were very prepared for us.”
The Bengals, 15-4 overall and 9-1 in conference, have found success similar to the Vikings, who are 13-8 overall and also 9-1 in conference, and they were able to outhit PSU in set scores. In the opening set the opponents remained close to a 12-all tie. After a pair of Bengal kills, the home team kept the lead until a kill by Mitchell put the Vikings up 22-21. In the end the home team went on a four-kill run to win 25-22.
Head coach Michael Seemann said that although the Vikings were able to keep a competitive scoring pattern early on, they were unable to settle in during the second and third set.
“[The Bengals] were playing fearless, and they set off their crowd quite a bit. They had great distribution offensively,” Seemann said.
After the first set loss the Vikings were unable to make the needed comeback. After an 11-10 early Viking lead, the Bengals took the lead in set two, and through set three the visiting Vikings were never able to regain it.
Friday’s match was led offensively for the Vikings by Mitchell and Jaklyn Wheeler with 10 kills each.
Not to be discouraged by Friday’s loss, the Vikings headed to Ogden, Utah, to take on Weber State, a young team that is still finding its rhythm.
The Vikings took control of the match, recording a season-best 14 service aces as a team, and held the Wildcats to .011 hitting percentage—an opponent season low for Big Sky play. After opening with a one-all tie in the first set, the Vikings never gave up the lead.
Mitchell said the team took what they learned about sticking together as a team from Idaho State and carried that concept into Weber State.
“We came very prepared. We switched our gears and really focused on the things we needed to do. Our serving and passing was on point and our hitters were right there behind,” Mitchell said.
The dominant serving was led by junior outside hitter Kaeli Patton, who slammed six aces for both a career best and season-best for an individual. With Patton behind the line, Mitchell led the team with eight kills and—most notably—no kill errors.
Seemann said he emphasized serving. “We talked about it every match, but doing it in another person’s gym is a tall order. It’s a much more challenging thing. The weight of your miss serves is much heavier when you have a crowd that’s thanking you when you do.”
The Vikings take their serving talents back to the Stott Center next weekend, where they will take on Dam Cup rival Eastern Washington on Thursday at 7 p.m. and Sacramento State on Saturday at 7 p.m.