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​Volleyball goes 1-1 over weekend

Cavaliers defeat NC State, fall to North Carolina

<p>Junior Haley Kole and&nbsp;Virginia split their weekend matches, defeating NC State before falling against North Carolina.</p>

Junior Haley Kole and Virginia split their weekend matches, defeating NC State before falling against North Carolina.

The Virginia volleyball team had a busy weekend, splitting its last two home games with a decisive win against NC State and a tough loss against North Carolina.

The 3-0 win (25-14, 25-22, 29-27) over NC State (15-15, 4-14 ACC) marked Virginia’s (18-11, 10-8 ACC) second straight 3-0 win. Coach Dennis Hohenshelt said he was proud of the way his team played.

“I just liked how we competed,” Hohenshelt said. “I like that word — I liked how we competed.”

Though the team still has work to do, the three game winning streak gave Virginia reinforcement rather than just a victory, Hohenshelt said.

“The biggest thing right now is that we have some confidence in what we are doing,” he said. “We’ve had some good practices, and that is starting to show in the gym right now.”

The match against No. 22 North Carolina (19-8, 16-2 ACC) was going to be a tough match for Virginia regardless of the momentum they were riding. The Tar Heels were flying high with a 10-match winning streak.

Though Virginia lost 3-0 officially (25-23, 25-22, 25-13), the match was closer than appears if one analyzes the individual set scores. The first and second sets went down to the wire, with North Carolina pulling away and getting ahead 2-0. The Cavaliers hung around in both sets, playing with intensity and focus.

“I think definitely the first and second games we fought so hard, and [we] stayed with them,” junior outside hitter Haley Kole said. “They’re a great program, and I think it just shows that we can hang with programs like that. We just need to work on maintaining that high level of play for longer.”

The third set saw Virginia fall behind early and never quite recover. North Carolina took a commanding lead and won the set in skilled fashion.

“They turned up the serving pressure a little bit,” Hohenshelt said. “We didn’t respond real well to it, and so I think we broke a little bit. Those things happen. You try to work back out of it, and it just never really came back to us. I would say the biggest thing is that their serve got to us a little bit.”

This was not the way Virginia would have liked to end the match, especially on senior night, but the close knit group still has an opportunity to make it to the NCAA tournament.

“We would have liked to go out with a win for our seniors,” Kole said. “We love them so much. They’ve contributed so much to the team [and] a win would have only helped us further in our journey to the postseason. A loss hurts, on a senior night, but it doesn’t hurt us completely. We have two away games and if we win both of those, we’ll see where it goes in the postseason.”

The Cavaliers are now gearing up for a significant weekend for them as they hit the road to finish off the regular season against Pittsburgh and Virginia Tech.

“Next weekend is probably the most important weekend of our entire season,” Kole said. “Pitt is a great team and so is Virginia Tech, [so] two wins in those arenas would be great for us.”

Virginia has already beaten both the Panthers (22-8, 12-6 ACC) and the Hokies (17-13, 8-10 ACC) this season, but they will not rely on that success for future ones. The Cavaliers will have to come out with the same high level of play they displayed in the first two sets against North Carolina.

“I think if we play like we did for the first 22 or 23 points of games one and two and we can put that together, we’re going to be pretty good next weekend and we’re going to be a tough out,” Hohenshelt said.

Virginia will travel to Pittsburgh Friday for a 4 p.m. showdown against Pittsburgh before heading over to Blacksburg, Va. Saturday for a 4 p.m. regular season finale against the Hokies.

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