RICHMOND, VA - The William and Mary volleyball team rallied on the road Friday night at VCU to pull out a thrilling, 3-2 victory over the Rams. The Tribe finished the season at 11-15 overall and 5-9 in the Colonial Athletic Association, while VCU is now 11-19, 9-5 in the league and must wait out this weekend's games to find out if it qualified for the CAA tournament.
Box Score
The come-from-behind victory was keyed by the efforts of the senior class, playing in their final collegiate match.
Cassie Crumal (Castle Rock, Colo.) had a career-high six kills on a .500 attack, and also recorded a double-double with 50 assists and 12 digs.
Lindsay Kresch (Moon Township, Pa.) also had a double-double with 15 kills and 14 digs, surpassing 500 kills in just two years at W&M.
Erin Skipper (Yorktown, Va.) hit a match-high 17 kills to go with nine digs, and with her 52 chances became the first player in school history to surpass 4,000 attack attempts.
Ginny Bray (Cary, N.C.) rounded out the class' efforts, hitting nine kills to go with five digs and five blocks, three of them solo. Also notable was sophomore
Gina Lang (Valparaiso, Ind.), who had a double-double with 15 kills and 14 digs. Freshman
Celine Alasomuka (Centreville, Va.) had 20 digs to raise her season total to 350.
After VCU opened the day takign the first set 25-18, W&M came roaring back in the second behind five kills from Lang. The Rams took an early lead at 15-9 with a six-one run, but the Tribe responded with a 6-2 run of its own that cut the lead to one at 16-15. The streak included a pair of blocks for W&M, the first from Bray and Skipper and the second from Bray and Lang. After another point from the home team, the Green and Gold took the lead at 18-17 after three straight points, including kills from both Bray and Crumal. VCU retook the lead with a 5-2 run, but the Tribe powered through to the victory with a 5-1 streak finished off by Lang's fifth kill of the set.
VCU took the third set, 25-20, ins pit of five kills from Kresch and four apiece from Lang and Skipper, before W&M flipped the score in the fourth set. Down 11-9 in the fourth, the Tribe scored six of the next seven points to open a 15-12 lead, and the College never allowed VCU to get closer than two the rest of the way. Bray scored two of the final three points to put W&M at set-point, before a VCU error pushed the Green and Gold over the top and tied the match at 2-2.
The fifth and final set threatened to be very tightly played after a VCU ace tied things at 5-5, but a kill by
Ginny Bray put the Tribe back on top for good, and
Gina Lang's service ace to push the lead to 7-5 only reinforced that fact. After the Rams cut the lead back to one, another kill by Bray and back-to-back errors on the part of VCU gave the Tribe a 10-6 lead and the ability to weather a final VCU run that cut the lead to 12-10. A fourth attack error by the home team ended the run, and
Gina Lang gave the Tribe match-point at 14-11 with her career-best 15th kill. The Rams got over-eager in trying to stave off match-point, delivering the win to the Green and Gold on their 39th error of the night.
The win gave William and Mary its third win over VCU in Richmond in as many years, and made this season the first one since 1990 to end with a victory.
