Nov. 24, 2006
ATLANTA – Taylor Parrish posted 20 kills and 14 digs and Sarah Munoz added 18 kills and 12 digs to lead Virginia Tech (17-14, 11-11 ACC) to a 3-1 (34-32, 22-30, 30-25, 30-19) win over Georgia Tech (20-11, 12-9 ACC) Friday night at O’Keefe Gymnasium. The loss is Tech’s first in the last 10 matches.
Talisa Kellogg led Georgia Tech with a season-high 23 kills while hitting .435 against the Hokies, and the Yellow Jacket offense hit .295 on the night. Lindsey Gray posted her fifth-straight double-double with 15 kills and 14 digs, while Ulrike Stegemann and Callie Miller added 12 and 10 kills, respectively.
Abby Showers led Tech with 15 digs against Virginia Tech, while Miller, Gray and Kellogg each had a team-high three blocks on the night.
Trailing 27-21 in game one, the Hokies used a 5-0 run, which included four kills by Taylor Parrish, to pull within one at 27-26. Tech earned the next two points on kills by Lindsey Gray and Talisa Kellogg, but Virginia Tech strung together three consecutive points to tie the match at 29-29. With the score still tied at 32-32, a blocking error by the Jackets and a block by Katie Esbrook and Sarah Munoz gave the Hokies the first game, 34-32.
Leading by one point early in game two, the Yellow Jackets used a 10-3 run to take a 19-11 lead and then held on for a 30-22 victory to even the match at 1-1. Talisa Kellogg paced the Yellow Jackets with eight kills and a .538 hitting percentage in the game, while the Jackets as a team hit .447.
Virginia Tech jumped out to a 7-2 lead in the third game by using a 5-0 run with the score tied at 2-2. Tech tied the match at 12-12 on a 3-0 run of its own, but Virginia Tech won five of the next six points before closing out the game, 30-25, to take a 2-1 lead in the match. The Jackets hit .333 in the game, but couldn’t contain the Hokies’ Esbrook, who had eight kills on nine attempts, for a .889 hitting percentage.
With the Yellow Jackets leading 8-7 in game four, Virginia Tech went on a 11-2 run to take control of the game at 19-9 before cruising to a 30-19 victory to snap the Yellow Jackets’ winning streak at nine. The Hokies hit a sterling .455 in the game, while Tech managed just .194
The Yellow Jackets will conclude their regular season Saturday night when they host the Virginia Cavaliers at 7:30 p.m. Live video for the match can be followed on ACC Select (gatech.playonsports.tv) while a radio broadcast can be heard on WREK-FM (91.1 FM in Atlanta/www.wrek.org). Livestats for all Georgia Tech matches can be found at www.ramblinwreck.com.
The match will be senior libero Abby Showers’ last at O’Keefe Gymnasium, and the Yellow Jackets will honor the Vandalia, Ohio native prior to the start of the match.
