The men's volleyball team did what head coach Joel Walton wanted it to do in Friday's first-round Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association tournament win over Quincy.
Walton said before the match that the key to the 30-27, 30-23, 30-23 victory was limiting the scoring opportunities of Quincy's middle attackers while setting the ball to the Cardinal middles often.
"Our offense ran at a high level," Walton said. "We passed well and got a lot of balls to our middles."
In the straight-set win, Ball State's defense limited the Hawks' middle attackers to 12 total kills and hitting percentages of .236, .111 and .000.
On the Cardinals' side of the net, senior middle attacker Matt Denmark had 12 kills, 6 blocks and an ace while hitting .647. The other middle attacker, freshman Zoran Grabovac, had five kills on .714 hitting.
Ball State hit .405 in the match to Quincy's .132. While the team hit .344 in the first game and a mediocre .222 in the second, it hit .750 in the final game. The Cardinals would have hit a perfect 1.000, except junior outside attacker Jary Delgado's kill was blocked one play before the match ended.
"The first game we had a couple of good runs, but we had runs were we didn't side out and let them catch up," Walton said. "In games two and three we had big runs and never let them run back at us."
Walton was impressed with his team's overall play, but he said he was particularly impressed with the Cardinals' defense. Ball State had 14 blocks to Quincy's six and 26 digs to the Lakers' 20.
Delgado and senior outside attacker Josh Zuidema also made significant contributions, Walton said. Delgado had eight kills and six blocks, while Zuidema added 12 kills and two aces while hitting .391.
The Cardinals now move on to face number-two seed Loyola-Chicago on Friday. The remaining games of the tournament will be at Lewis, the number one seed. In the other semifinal match Lewis will play five-seed IPFW, who beat four-seed Ohio State.
Although Walton was pleased with the Cardinals' play Friday night, he said there is still room for improvement. One area he said they need to do better in is serving. The team had 14 service errors against Quincy. Delgado, Denmark, Zuidema and Kyle Weindel had three apiece.
Read More
Three Air Jam teams take home the win
October 12, 2012Nineteen teams shimmied, shook and flipped for a sold out John R. Emens Auditorium on Thursday night during the 25th annual Air Jam.
Bill Clinton Speaks at North Central High School
October 12, 2012Former President's Speech Could Have Effect on State Senate Race
