Trying to catch Duke by surprise, Virginia volleyball (7-20, 1-10 ACC) came out tipping instead of trying to slam the ball away and took the first game, 30-28. But Duke (20-6, 8-3) adjusted and won the next three games, 30-22, 30-25 and 30-17, to pull away from the Cavaliers and win last night at University Hall.
Virginia coach Melissa Aldrich Shelton "told us right before we went out that for the first five swings, she wanted three of them to be tips for each person because she wanted to suck them in before they could start hitting back and it would get them off-guard," Virginia outside hitter Paige Davis said. "I think it really worked. That's something we didn't continue to do in each game afterward."
With a slim 23-22 edge in the first game, the Cavaliers reeled off five straight points, the latter four with freshman outside hitter Kristin Chaney serving. Chaney had one of two aces during the first game.
After Duke scored the next three, Virginia called time out. Three more Blue Devil points tied the score at 28 and Virginia called another timeout.
The Cavaliers came back after this timeout and responded. Junior middle Shannon Boyle and sophomore middle Alexis Geocaris slammed down consecutive kills, both off sophomore setter Lily Phillips' sets, to seal the game.
"In the first game, we just in general played well," Aldrich Shelton said. We "caught a Duke team that had been on the road all day and was looking at a team that was in eighth place and not quite as hyped up as they needed to be."
Duke bounced back in the second game, opening up an early 13-6 lead and cruising to a 30-22 victory. The Blue Devils hit an astounding .543 in this game, not committing a single attack error.
The third game was much closer, but Virginia never could narrow the gap enough as Duke went up 15-11 early and pushed their lead to five late, 28-23. Virginia closed to 28-25, but Duke junior outside hitter Tassy Rufai, who only played the next two points all night, came in and put the game away.
Duke sailed to a 30-17 victory in the final game. With a slim 6-5 edge, the Blue Devils won 16 of the next 21 points and pulled away.
"In the first game, [tipping] worked really well," Aldrich Shelton said. "Then, the strategy was to keep mixing it in with a lot of hard hits and we struggled with that. We really didn't hit much after we fell off our tipping plan, so that was disappointing."
Duke had four players with double digit kills and the Blue Devils hit .344 as a team.
Virginia managed to hit only .156 as a team, including a .028 hitting percentage in the fourth game. Junior middle Shannon Boyle led the Cavaliers with a season-high 17 kills and also had four blocks. Davis added her t10th double-double with 11 kills and 14 digs, as well as adding a career-high five assists. Phillips also had a double-double with 44 assists and 11 digs.
In the first game, "we hit well, we were in their face blocking, and our ball control was awesome," Davis said. "Those were the things that started to break down later."
Virginia will return to action this weekend in its final home matches of the season. Wake Forest comes to town Saturday night and Florida State will visit Sunday.
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