Hornets fall to UMES Hawks 3-0: Volleyball News
Alabama State University volleyball team (ASU Hornets) suffered a set-back at the hands of hosts UMES Hawks in the opening match of the University of Maryland Eastern Shore Invitational. The town of Princess Anne in Maryland hosted the volleyball scrimmage
on Friday, September 30.
UMES Hawks came out thundering and finished the match in straight sets by 3-0 (252-19, 25-13, 25-12). The Hawks made a perfect opening in the home series and also gave their Head Coach, Don Metil, his 100th victory in the school volleyball program.
Victory improved Hawks’ winning record to 7-6 in the season and 1-0 in the running tournament, while ASU Hornets fell to 7-15 on the year.
Lady Hawks had an overall hitting percentage of .448. Kaveinga Lea'Aetoa notched 11 kills for UMES and committed only one error in 13 attacks. Another scoring machine on the Hawks squad, Saitaua Iosia, was equally active on the net and added 11 valuable
points to the score of winning team. On the Hornets’ side, Maya Bell drew the audience’s attention with her 10 kills and six digs in the match.
The home squad started out with confident serves and jumped straight to an early lead of 4-1. Ndidi Ibe choked-up the attack from the visiting team with her amazing block tactics. UMES controlled the net action and started increasing the gap. In between,
ASU got better but the Hawks regained a commanding position by scoring the next seven of eight points, while the scoreboard showed 14-12. Afterwards, Hornets kept trying to catch up but UMES sealed the first set win at 25-19.
Hawks enjoyed good support from the home fans. Carrying their momentum forward, The UMES ladies kicked off the second set with 4-0 run. The pressure seemed to be getting to the Lady Hornets as they struggled to cope with the power of the hosts. They shortened
the gap of points to 4-5 but Hawks came up with a burst of six successive points, which pushed the Hornets way behind 4-11. Maline Vaitai showed no mercy to the guest team and pitched out point after point. ASU moved on at a slow pace, whereas Hawks extended
the lead to 2-0 by capturing second set 25-13.
Third set saw the Hawks put up another great show of volleyball. They hit the rivals from all angles and flabbergasted them with the quality of attacks. Lady Hornet could score only 12 points and accepted the better position of Hawks in third set and also
in the match.
The winning squad of University of Maryland Eastern Shore is now scheduled take on North Carolina Central and CSU Bakersfield on Saturday. On the other hand, the Lady Hornets will put up against Hampton University in the second round of the UMES Invitational.
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