Nov. 23, 2011
ATLANTA – The Georgia Tech women’s volleyball team finished its 2011 campaign out with a 3-0 loss to Clemson on Wednesday night in front of a crowd of 859 at O’Keefe Gymnasium. The Jackets fell to 15-16 on the season, 8-12 in conference play, marking the first losing season for Tech since 1990 when the Jackets went 8-30.
Tech was led by All-ACC honoree Monique Mead who notched her 10th kill of the night at the 13-21 mark in the third set to finish out the season recording double-digit kills in each and every game she played in 2011. Five other Jackets had more than five kills on the night. Kaleigh Colson was close to yet another triple double, as she netted 32 kills, nine digs and six kills on the night.
Clemson (20-11, 12-9 ACC) was led by Sandra Adeleye who notched a game high 15 kills, seven of those coming in the first set.
The Jackets got behind early in game one and just could not catch up. After Clemson began the game with a 6-0 run, Tech countered with a 3-0 run of their own. Tech also went on a 5-1 run in the middle of the game to bring things to one, but Clemson took a five point lead (22-17) and Tech couldn’t make up the difference falling in set one, 25-22. Sandra Adeleye led all hitters with seven kills in the first half while Mead put down five of her own.
Tech fell behind early but put together a 9-2 run in the middle of the game to bring what was a 14-18 deficit to a 23-20 lead. However, Clemson strung a few plays of their own together to finish out the game with a 6-1 run. Tech had some bad luck late in the game when, at 24-25, it looked as though a Clemson player had a net violation against them but after the refs conferred, they decided to replay the point and what would have been a 25-25 game, turned into a 26-24 victory for Clemson. Both Quinn Evans and Jennifer Percy put down four kills in the set, but were outblocked 4-1.
The third set was entirely in favor of the Tigers. Clemson got out to a 7-0 lead and built it up to 16-3 before the Jackets mounted a comeback. Tech finally earned their first point off of a serve at the 17-6 mark and ended up bringing the game within five (18-23) but it just wasn’t enough as the Tigers went on to earn the 25-19 victory.
