10B SPORTS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18, 2007
VOLLEYBALL
Kansas drops final two games of match in loss to Baylor
Photos by Jon Goering/KANSAN
Above: Members of the KU volleyball team celebrate after a point during the second game of the match against Baylor Wednesday night in the Horejsi Family Athletics Center.
Left: Emily Brown, senior right side/setter, and Natalie Uhart, senior middle blocker, block a spike from a Baylor hitter.
Kansas scrapped and gritted its way to a 2-1 lead, but the team's early match magic evaporated along with its lead as Kansas fell 3-2 (30-24, 26-30, 28-30, 30-26, 15-1) to Baylor on Wednesday night at the Horejsi Family Athletics Center.
The loss dropped the laj Hawks to 10-10 overall and 3-7 in the Big 12 Conference, while the Bears improved to 10-10, and 3-7 in the Big 12.
Discouraging and disappointing were just a few of the words coach Ray Bechard used to describe the loss.
"They played a little cleaner and I think they said, 'Hey, we're
in game five on the road' and I think they valued that opportunity a little more than we did and that's disappointing." Bechard said. "In the end, we desperately needed a win tonight and we couldn't get it."
Kansas was plagued all game by a low hitting efficiency. The Jayhawks hit .171 as a team while Baylor hit .234. The game continued a seasonlong trend for the Jayhawks, who came into tonight with the lowest team hitting percentage in the Big 12.
"You just can't let that happen, especially in the Big 12," senior setter Emily Brown said of the loss. "I don't know if we just kind of had a mentality of, 'Hey, we're playing at home, and that's just going to give us that extra edge,' but you can't rely on that in the Big 12."
Brown finished the game with 14 kills, 27 assists and 14 digs in the losing effort. It was the Lausing native's third triple-double of the season.
Junior middle blocker Natalie Uhart and sophomore outside hitter Flavio Lino each added 12 kills for the lavhawks.
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Kansas had an opportunity to close out the match in game four, but Kansas couldn't find a rhythm and Baylor turned an early 5-4 advantage into a 30-26 game four victory.
After splitting the first two games, Kansas gutted out a tight
"In the end, we desperately needed a win tonight and we couldn't get it."
RAY BECHARD Volleyball coach
A resilient Kansas team fought back from an early hole to grab game two. Down 15-8, Kansas's dormant offense found the accelerator. The Jayhawks went on a 10-0 run to take an 18-15 lead, and parlayed the big run into a 30-26 victory. Emily Brown had four kills in game two, while sophomore setter Katie Martincich was active on both offense and defense with eight assists and three digs.
game three, 30-28. A kill from freshman outside hitter Karina Garlington punctuated an early 5-1 Kansas run, and the Jayhawks kept the Bears at a distance throughout most of game three. But Baylor fought back twice, first tying the game at 24-24, and then again at 27-27. Brown broke the tie with a block assist, and then Uhart added a kill to clinch the game for Kansas.
Kansas squandered an early 4-1 lead in game one, and dropped the opening game 30-24. After kills from Flavia Lino and Natalie Uhart helped Kansas build its early lead, the Kansas offense stalled. Kansas had 11 kills in 40 attempts for a .025 hitting percentage, while Baylor got stronger as the game continued and finished with a .297 hitting percentage.
"I don't know if jumping out early in game one gave us false sense that things were going to go pretty easy tonight, but everybody knows there is no easy night in this league," Bechard said.
— Edited by Luke Morris
volleyball notebook
UP NEXT
Kansas travels to Lincoln, Neb. on Saturday to play No. 1 Nebraska. The Cornhuskers are the defending National Champions, feature the reigning national player of the year, Sarah Pavan, and are 17-0 after a win at Missouri Wednesday night.
LATE START
The Kansas football team isn't the only team to have a game delayed by this week's soggy weather. The start of the game was pushed back to 7:30 p.m. from its scheduled 7 p.m. start time because the inclement weather delayed Baylor's arrival.
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Rustin Dodd
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