California Lutheran University’s Women’s Volleyball team swept the Whittier Poets this past Friday in the Regals’ first Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference match of the season.
Before the match, Head Coach Kellee Roesel and Assistant Coach Alec Bennett established a game plan of how the Regals could win based on past matches with the Poets.
“Coming into today we were really thinking about containing their outside hitters,” Bennett said. “Whoever they were gonna throw in on that outside position, and then making their bigger players move quick, so we were trying to establish pretty quick offense to catch them off guard.”
Fifth-year middle blocker Kira Mortensen, senior outside hitter Sophia Muller, and fifth-year setter Tess Holbert said they set initial goals before the game played out and said what was going through their minds during their first SCIAC match.
Mortensen said her goal was to play her own game and mainly focus on what she was doing inside that court. Her final record was 10 kills and five blocks for this match.
“I like to treat every point, like, the same,” Mortensen said. “Doesn’t matter if it’s a set point, I’m like ‘give me the ball.’ It’s the same time every time and I’m gonna play how I play.”
Muller ended up with 11 kills and two blocks for her first conference match of the season. She said the team’s goal was to come out strong and show off its game.
“Knowing that I can trust everyone around me and behind me, whether I’m passing, hitting, blocking, just trusting girls around me and just trusting myself knowing I can do my job,” Muller said.
Holbert said her game plan was to command and serve aggressively with full confidence, and trusting her teammates while playing against the Poets.
“I’m always in a quick-acting mindset. I just wanna do my best to get my feet to the ball and make sure that I’m setting up the hitters to be successful, and making sure that I’m matching up well,” Holbert said. “Just making smart decisions for my team so they can be successful.”
Throughout the match, the Regals responded to the Poets’ attacks, going back and forth during the first and second set. The Regals were able to keep the momentum going, even when the Poets were fighting back in the last set. However, the Regals declared a 3-0 victory after a Poets service error.
“We went one-on-one with them last year so that was a big win and a big game for us,” Holbert said. “And I’m just beyond proud of our team, we worked so hard and we earned it.”
Coming off of a 0-3 loss to Chapman Saturday, the Regals are set to face the University of La Verne Leopards at home in the team’s next conference game on Friday, Oct. 4.
