Nov. 21, 2003
ORLANDO, FLA – Lauren Sauer connected for 20 kills and hit .349 while Laura Kuhn and Alexandra Preiss each combined for seven blocks as the No. 6 Georgia Tech volleyball team defeated Florida State in a quarterfinal match of the 2003 ACC Volleyball Championship, 30-23, 29-31, 30-19, 30-27. With the win, the Yellow Jackets improve to 29-1 while the Seminoles fall to 16-16.
“It was a rusty start for us as a team, but we have said as the number one seed that the thing you’ve got to do is work hard and have fun,” said head coach Bond Shymansky. “I’ve never seen a one seed in this tournament have any fun, and our team was a little unsure if they were willing to do that, but they showed that as the match went on that they really did want to have fun on the court. Florida State did a good job today. They are such a gritty team that they bring out the fire in our team and that was fantastic to see.”
“We knew that success for us today had to start with our rightside blocking and to shut down their outside hitters and Laura Kuhn did a fantastic job today and that’s a great start for her in this tournament. Jayme Gergen is such a force for us and started off so hot and forced Florida State to try and focus on her, which then allowed Kele to get other hitters involved in our offense. For our players who weren’t all-ACC, they have some extra fire and emotion and they both started off on the right foot today.”
The Yellow Jackets advance Saturday’s semifinal match of the tournament and will take on Virginia (25-8) at 1:30 p.m. at the Disney Wide World of Sports Complex.
“We are excited to play Virginia tomorrow,” said Shymansky. As always, it’s very tough to beat a team three times during the course of a season. Virginia is a hot team right now and are doing some great things on offense and defense and I’m sure it’s going to be a great match tomorrow.”
The difference in the match was the blocking job of the Jackets as Tech posted 15 team blocks in the match while the Seminoles had only 10. In addition to Kuhn and Preiss, Gergen added five block assists while Eveland posted three. Defensively, Lynnette Moster had a team high 15 digs in the match while Marisa Aston recorded 14, Keight Vincent 12 and Jennifer Randall 10.
Offensively, the Jackets struggled, hitting a season low .220 in the match. Lynnette Moster posted 18 kills and hit .209 while Preiss had nine kills and hit .368 and Gergen had eight kills while hitting .278. Eveland recorded 56 assists in the match.
At the service line Tech was strong, recording eight service aces while holding the Seminoles to one. Gergen notched a career high three aces in the match while Vincent tied her season high with three, as well.
