Oct. 2, 2005
Head coach Bond Shymansky recorded his 100th career coaching victory as the Georgia Tech volleyball team rallied from a 2-1 deficit to defeat Miami in five games (37-35, 27-30, 11-30, 32-30, 15-9) Sunday afternoon. With the win, the Yellow Jackets even their record at 6-6, 3-1 ACC while the Hurricanes fall to 7-5, 2-2 ACC.
With his win today, Shymansky becomes just the second head coach in Tech volleyball history to post 100 wins, taking just 123 matches to do so, making him the quickest coach in the program’s history to record the feat.
“The phrase we used all weekend was mental fortitude,” said head coach Bond Shymansky. “We showed it against Florida State and it was severly tested again today against Miami. We are still a team that plays up and down from game to game but we have a tremendous amount of talent and applied true team togetherness today to win on the road. Our young outside hitters keep learning and were more aggressive today and we got inspired play from Ulli and Lindsey Laband as well as tremendous passing and defense from Jennifer Randall.”
The Yellow Jackets will return to action Friday when they host the undefeated Maryland Terrapins in O’Keefe Gym at 7 p.m.
For the second time this weekend, Ulrike Stegemann posted a career-high 20 kills to lead the Jackets. She hit a team-best .302 in the match while posting three block assists. In addition, Laura DeMichelis recorded 14 kills, followed by Callie Miller who had 12 kills and hit .250 and Talisa Kellogg who had 11 kills. Lindsey Laband recorded 52 assists in the match.
At the net, Nikki Kaminskas led the Jackets with 10 total blocks while DeMichelis added five blocks and Stegemann chipped in three block assists.
Defensively, Jennifer Randall led the way with a match-high 20 digs on the afternoon. She was followed by Lindsey Gray, Laband and Kellogg who all had seven digs.
At the service line, the Jackets recorded eight aces as Stegemann, Gray and Randall each had two.
Miami was led by Francheska Savage who had 16 kills and Karla Johnson who had 14 kills in the match.
Tech built an early 12-7 lead behind the serving of Lindsey Gray who recorded a service ace and then forced the Hurricanes into five straight hitting errors. But Miami came back, tying the game at 13-13 after a hitting error and a blocking error by Kellogg. The Hurricanes then built a 20-18 lead after a hitting error by DeMichelis, but a serving error by Karla Johnson gave the Jackets the point at 19-20. The game went back and forth and was tied at 24-24 before Miami took a 28-24 lead with a serving error by Kellogg, a hitting error from Stegemann and two straight kills by the Hurricanes. After a kill from Stegemann gave the Jackets the serve, Tech scored on a stuff block by Miller and Stegemann but then followed it up with a service error by Kaminskas to make the score 26-29. Stegemann recorded a kill to give Tech the serve and then she served the next three points as the Jackets scored on a hitting error by Johnson, a service ace by Stegemann and a hitting error by Miami to give the Jackets a 30-29 lead. The Jackets then had five game points, but were unable to convert as Miami continued to tie the score. With the score 34-35, Stegemann and Kaminskas recorded a stuff block to tie the game at 35-35, and then a hitting error by Robinson and a kill from Miller gave the Jackets game one, 37-35.
In game two, the Jackets held a 16-11 lead but Miami tied the game at 17-17 after two straight hitting errors from Miller, a blocking error by Laband and a kill from Johnson. Miami then built a 24-20 lead on a kill from Ashley Woods and Ciara Michel. The Hurricanes went on to win the game, 30-27 after a kill from Michel. In the game, Miami hit .371 while the Jackets hit .293.
Game three saw Miami start off with 4-0 lead and never look back as Tech’s serving and passing struggled. In the game, the Jackets were aced five times and recorded three serving errors. In addition, the Jackets recorded several overpasses and were never able to get into their offense. In the game, Tech recorded only six kills and hit -.033 while Miami posted 14 kills and hit .440.
Despite falling down 0-4 in game four, Tech managed to chip away at Miami’s lead and tied the score at 14-14 on a kill from DeMichelis. The Jackets then built a 24-18 lead after two kills from Stegemann and two service aces from Randall. However, Miami came right back and took a 25-24 lead as the Jackets could not sideout and Miami’s offense recorded two kills while Tech posted three straight errors. The Jackets then took a 27-26 lead as Kaminskas and DeMichelis recorded a stuff block and Miami had hitting errors from Michel and Robinson. Miami came back with three straight kills from Johnson to take a 29-27 lead. The Jackets responded with a kill in the middle of the court from Miller and then a hitting error by Johnson tied the game at 29-29. After a kill by Johnson gave Miami a match point, DeMichelis responded with one of her four kills to tie the game at 30-30. A kill from Miller then gave Tech a 31-30 lead and the Jackets scored the final point of the game on a service ace from Gray.
In the final game, Miami held an early 3-2 lead but the Jackets tied the game at 3-3 on a hitting error from Johnson. The game was tied at 5-5 before Tech scored on a kill from Miller and a hitting error by Ashley Woods game the Jackets a 7-5 lead. Miami narrowed the score to 7-6 on a kill from Sara Duncan, but it would be as close as the Hurricanes would get. The Jackets then recorded points on a block from Kaminskas and Laband and two Miami hitting errors to take a 10-6 lead. Woods then recorded a kill cutting the score to 10-7, but Kaminskas responded with a kill of her own making it 10-7. After a hitting error from Stegemann made it 11-8, Stegemann came back with another kill and then a serviced ace from Michelle Kandell and a hitting error from Johnson gave the Jackets a 14-8 lead. The Jackets scored the final point of the game and the match on a service error from Savage.
