#8 Vikings start the Gulf District with a 3-1 win against Palm Beach State

Lake City, FL.  SJR State wins their opening match 20-25, 25-18, 25-19, 25-23 over Palm Beach State College.  

Set 1 20-25

Early in the set neither team lead by more than 2 points until Palm Beach scored 3 in a row to take a 17-14 lead.  The Panthers grew their lead to 20-16 and held on for a 25-20 win.  Mayya Kucherova led the Vikings with 4 kills and 6 digs.  

Set 2 25-18

After shaking off the first set jitters, the Vikings jumped out to a 10-4 lead.  Palm Beach got within 4 points, trailing 16-20 and a 5-2 run by the Vikings ended the set.  Hope Harrington hit a perfect 100% with 5 kills on 5 swings.  Rickie Sheets had 4 kills and a block, Cassidy Casey had 2 aces.  

Set 3  25-19

The Vikings built an early 10-5 lead and continued to serve tough resulting in 5 aces in set 3 alone.  Cassidy Casey led the Vikings with 5 kills, Kucherova had 7 digs.  

Set 4 25-23

The teams traded points unitl a 4 point run by Palm Beach gave them a 11-9 lead.  The Vikings won 9 of the next 14 points to take an 18-16 lead only to see Palm Beach tie the set at 21 all.  Only 1 of the next 7 points was earned as boht teams made unforced errors, the final point being an attack error by the Panthers to give the match to the Vikings.   

LEADERS

Kills - Cassidy Casey and Rickie Sheets 12

Assists - Mone Gordon 41

Digs - Dariana Luna 19

Aces - Gordon and Casey 3

Blocks - Casey and Sheets 2

Points - Cassidy Casey 16

Cohen's Comments

This was a hard fought match by both teams.  If we want to continue to win at this event we will need to play much better tomorrow.  Our unforced errors were too high but our aggressive serving, 11 aces, allowed us to win tonight.  

Up Next

The Vikings advance to face Lake Sumter State College in the winner's bracket finals tomorrow at 4PM.