March 13, 2009 |
Denver, CO-The men's volleyball team started their westward swing Friday night in Denver, Colorado with a 3-2 loss to Johnson & Wales. Graceland fell 20-30, 25-30, 30-18, 30-22 and 11-15.
Saturday night however Graceland came to play. The Jackets defeated Johnson in Wales in four games by scores of: 30-27, 25-30, 30-26 & 30-27.
Stats were not available at the time of release. As soon as the are received they will be posted.
"This was a good weekend for us," stated Coach McDole after Saturday's games. "The first night against Johnson and Wales we did not pass as well as we should have. Our lack of success passing contributed highly to our lack of success offensively! Johnson and Wales did a good job of controlling our middles. However that allowed our outside hitters to be successful. Dan Parish had a great night hitting 545% with 15 kills and Kevin Allison hit 400% with 15 kills as well," continued McDole. "However after watching game film and learning from our mistakes we came out extremely prepared and motivated to win on Saturday. We could not have executed our scouting report better! We neutralized their middles and shut down their outside swing! We knew they were going to key on our middles and we let them do that. We just threw the ball to our outside hitters all night and with much better passing and some amazing defense from senior libero Pono Yin we felt like we controlled the entire match and came away with a great win! We were extremely pleased and excited. Personally this was the proudest experience I have ever had as a head coach. We had a great night and really came together as a unit. It was a really fun match! We are looking forward to our week in California," concluded Coach McDole
The Jackets will now head onto California where they'll open play Tuesday at Orange Coast College Costa Mesa, California at 2pm pacific. Stay tuned to the Jacket athletics website for continuing coverage of the men's volleyball team and all of Jacket athletics.
For More Information on Graceland University Athletics Contact:
Matt Shelton, Sports Information Director
(641) 784-5318
mshelton@graceland.edu
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