Volleyball Completes Two Sweeps in One Day

Photo taken by Greer Patten.

Belmont’s volleyball team swept two opponents Friday, the Arkansas-Pine Bluff Golden Lions and the Nicholls State Colonels.

The Bruins had no trouble with the still winless Golden Lions, winning the three sets with scores of 25-12, 25-15 and 25-12. However, it seemed like it would be a competitive match early on.

The first match started in a deadlock until sophomore Lucy Kay got the first of her match-high seven kills. From there, Belmont pushed the score to 12-6 behind a 6-0 run.

Led by senior Lilly Lutz and three of her match-high six aces, the Bruins had the momentum they needed to pull away.

Belmont outscored UAPB 15-5 after Lutz’s dominant run of serving the ball to end the set       25-12.

“I thought that was probably one of her best matches of the year tonight,” Belmont head coach Fritz Rosenberg said, “She was tuned in, serving, passing and defensively.”

Belmont exposed the Golden Lions' inability to return serves, as evidenced by the eight team aces attributed to Lutz, freshman Jordan Czajkowski, junior Connie Kofoed and senior Brooke Gilleland.

Additionally, the Golden Lions appeared to have trouble with the size of Belmont’s frontline, as the Bruins have eight players listed at 6-foot or taller on their roster compared to just one for UAPB.

If the Golden Lions were going to adjust it needed to be fast, as the Bruins jumped out to a 1-0 lead after another blistering kill from Kay.

After trading kills, Belmont narrowly led by one when Lutz slid back over to the service area. Her commanding presence helped Belmont go on a 4-0 run, with an ace and two Gilleland kills.

UAPB answered back in a big way, cutting the deficit to 7-6 and forcing a Belmont timeout.

Coming out of the timeout, it became the Brooke Gilleland show.

Gilleland had a kill, ace and kept the possession alive by charging ten feet out of bounds and saving what appeared to be an unsavable ball.

However, her heroics did not last long, as UAPB answered again by cutting the deficit to one.  

Then, junior Emily Warmenhoven and sophomore Alivia Keegan combined for five straight points for the Bruins, with Warmenhoven adding three kills and Keegan supplying two aces. Lutz, with two more aces, led another scoring surge late to fight off a Golden Lions rally attempt.

Freshman Hayden McGehee finished the 25-15 victory with an ace and the Bruins had a convincing 2-0 lead over the Golden Lions.

In the third match, the Bruins overpowered their opponents, as the talent discrepancy became all too apparent. Belmont was bigger, hit harder and had a much deeper bench of players.

Despite multiple lengthy delays, the Bruins were able to secure a 25-15 victory and a sweep of the Golden Lions.

All told, the Bruins had 31 more points, 12 more kills, 11 more assists, four more digs and three more wins compared to the Golden Lions. In addition, Belmont had 17 aces to UAPB’s 0.

Belmont would need another strong performance in the matchup against undefeated Nicholls State and Lutz said that an opponent like Nicholls State “brings a fire under us.”

“It’s going to be a gritty one, one where we have to compete,” Lutz said, “I think we just go in with the mentality of we want to win.”

Early on, it would be a tightly contested set, but the Bruins began to find momentum after the Colonels tied the score at five each.

From that point forward, the Bruins had three separate runs of four or more consecutive points and were led by five Warmenhoven kills, with the last two icing the first set 25-12.

Ferocity and velocity were on full display as the Bruins' front line of Warmenhoven, junior Brenna Kauffeld and senior Bella Mathis were hammering the ball.

“They like to swing hard,” Rosenberg said, “and when you pass the ball as well as we did, there are opportunities to get a lot of one-on-one situations where we can attack.”

 Belmont intentionally remained the aggressor throughout the match. 

“Watching film this morning, I thought they could really put some pressure on you if you’re not careful,” Rosenberg said.

During the beginning of set two, the Colonels started applying some of that pressure, especially after an overturned call changed the score from a 6-4 Bruins’ lead to a 5-5 tie.

However, Belmont managed to regroup and rattled off six consecutive points to take a dominant 11-5 lead.

That momentum was all Gilleland needed as she rattled off four quick kills during a stretch that expanded the Bruins' lead to 16-8.

Nicholls State tried to make things interesting late, but Lutz silenced its rally with an ace to close out the set 25-13.

Lutz tied her strong serving performance to her desire “just to ace people. I talk about it in practice all the time.”

Afterward, the third set saw Belmont take a commanding 6-2 lead early before expanding it to 16-5 quickly.

During that stretch, Gilleland and Kay each had two kills and a block to dominate the battle of the front line throughout the set.

Nicholls State, undefeated with only one set lost all year, left the Curb Event Center on the wrong side of a sweep after Belmont defeated them 25-10 in the final set.

In the end, Belmont outscored Nicholls State by 41 points, 28 kills, 25 assists, 12 digs and 11 aces.

On the day, Gilleland led the Bruins with 19 kills, Lutz contributed 21 digs and seven aces and Czajkowski added 32 assists.

The Bruins are back in action Saturday in the Curb Event Center as they look to add to their four-game winning streak against the Tennessee State Lady Tigers.

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This article was written by Sam Dicus