Nathan Forest
nforest@uwyo.edu
The UW Cowgirls came up victorious in a knock-down drag-out five set match against the San Jose State Spartans on Saturday at the UniWyo Sports Complex.
The Cowgirls lost the first set 22-25, 25-13, 24-26, 25-23, 15-11 to bring UW to 21-6 on the season. The Cowgirls will advance to 11-4 in the Mountain West while San Jose State falls to 13-16 on the season and 5-11 in the Mountain West.
Both teams having troubles with officials characterized the match, and the game was stopped several times to sort out calls.
“They [players] did a good job of staying focused on what they had to do,” coach Chad Callihan said. “When time came for them to make plays they stepped up and made them.”
The first set was an absolute battle with both teams going back and forth throughout the set. Overall there were 13 ties and seven lead changes before the Spartans pulled away and won the set.
In the second set, the Cowgirls took charge early and held on ferociously stretching their leads out to as many as 11 and 12 points. In this set the Cowgirls allowed no tie scores or lead changes at all.
Set three was another battle between these two teams with few major leads, including 14 ties with five lead changes.
In the fourth set, the Cowgirls jumped out to an early lead of 12-4, but the Spartans rallied back to bring the score back to 13-13. From there on out it was a fight to the finish.
During the fifth set, the Cowgirls jumped to an early three point lead and held onto that for the rest of the set to finish out the match 3-2 for the Cowgirls.
The Cowgirl offense had four players go into double digits in points, Bridget Shanahan led the group with 19 points. Kayla Slofkiss followed close behind with 17.5 points and Kayla Henderson and Reed Copeland were next with 11.5 and 11 points respectively.
Slofkiss also helped the Cowgirls out defensively with 15 digs, though Allison Waldvogel led the team with 17 digs. Cori Aafedt was able to put up 25 assists for the team and Courtney Chacon had 23 assists.
Tyanna Roy ran the Spartan offense, ending the night with 25 points; Sara Hibbs was hot on her heels with 19 points. Yavianliz Rosado managed the Spartan defense with 14 digs, while Jamie Hirai came up with 13 digs.
Allison Meehan was also able to dig up 10 balls and put up 49 assists on the night.
The Cowgirl’s next game will be on Wednesday when they take on Fresno State in Fresno, California at 8 p.m.
