Oct. 17, 2004
MORAGA, Calif. - The 15th-ranked Santa Clara volleyball team dropped a hard fought West Coast Conference match to 14th-ranked Saint Mary's in four games in Moraga, Calif. on Saturday night. With the loss, the Broncos fall to 12-4 overall and 3-2 in conference action.
After trailing early in game one, the Broncos evened the score at 9-9 before taking their first lead of the match at 12-11 on a Cassie Perret kill. SCU would rattle off two more points, forcing Saint Mary's to take its first time-out with Santa Clara leading 14-11. The Broncos increased their advantage to five when the SCU block made the score 16-11. The Gaels continued to battle, reducing the SCU lead to 18-16 when head coach Jon Wallace took his first time-out. Santa Clara would come out of the break and build a six-point lead at the 24-18 mark on an Anna Cmaylo kill. The Bronco block would continue to highlight the SCU defense, giving the Broncos a 27-21 advantage before sealing the game victory on a Kim McGiven kill.
Game two would see the Broncos fight off three game points before dropping the game 31-29. Santa Clara trailed 29-26 as Saint Mary's tried to close out the game. Annalisa Muratore started the Bronco rally with a kill to drop the Gael lead to two points. A kill from McGiven would keep the Broncos alive at 29-28. Once again, the Bronco block came through for SCU as a double block from Perret and Annalisa Muratore evened the game at 29-29. However, a Santa Clara service error gave SMC another game point before the Gaels sealed the game on a double block of their own.
The third game would be as close as the second game as the teams were knotted at 26-26. SCU would take a temporary lead as Perret and Annalisa Muratore's block put SCU up 27-26. After trading points, the teams would wind up even again at 29-29. A SMC kill gave the Gaels game point before Perret was called for a ball handling error to close out the game.
SMC jumped out to an early 7-3 advantage in the fourth game, but the Broncos would battle back to tie the game at 10-10. However, the Gael's would hit a match-high .375 in the game to pull away and post a 30-23 game victory.
McGiven led SCU with 20 kills on the night. Toni Muratore posted 19 kills and connected at a .400 clip for the match. Defensively, Caroline Walters tallied a match-high 24 digs.
Santa Clara will return to the Leavey Center next weekend when it hosts a pair of WCC rivals from Southern California. On Friday night, SCU will take-on Loyola Marymount before a Sunday afternoon meeting with Pepperdine at 3:00 p.m. Sunday's contest will be broadcast on College Sports Television.
