BLACKSBURG, Va. – The William & Mary volleyball team held off Robert Morris for a 3-1 (25-23, 25-22, 23-25, 25-21) triumph in its second match of the Hokie Invitational Friday evening. A balanced attack from the Tribe (1-4) led to head coach Tim Doyle's first career win.
 
Offensively, senior Heather Pippus led all player with 13 kills and added nine digs, while freshman Claire Farrell drilled 12 kills in 28 attempts with just three errors for a .312 hitting percentage. Junior Casey Foote recorded a match-high 26 digs and senior Katie Kemp paced the Tribe in assists (21).
 
In the opening stanza, W&M capitalized on a multitude of RMU (0-5) errors to race out to a 21-13 lead. The Colonials then recovered with a 9-2 run to come within striking distance of rallying from the large deficit. RMU evened the contest at 23-all, but sophomore Kate Dedrick hammered back-to-back kills to close out game one.
 
Late in the second set, the Tribe held a 24-19 margin behind five unanswered points. However, a kill from RMU's Alyson Londot and two straight W&M errors made it a 24-22 affair. Out of a timeout, freshman Anne Louise Seekford swung the set-clinching kill for the 2-0 match lead.
 
RMU was able to erase a late three-point deficit in the third set to avoid a sweep. Back-to-back kills from Farrell bookmarked a 4-0 jolt to give W&M a 20-17 lead. However, the Colonials managed to pull even at 22-all, before outscoring the Tribe 3-1 in the final possessions of the period.
 
The Green and Gold came out aggressive in the fourth set in taking a commanding 11-5 advantage. The Colonials only came within four-points of digging out their hole, before the Tribe sealed the win behind a match-clinching spike from Farrell.
 
Quotable
"We started slow in our morning match against Virginia Tech, didn't play aggressively enough and let them dictate the pace of the match. Our serve receive let us down and couldn't get any offense running. The afternoon match was a big turnaround mentally for us. We came out firing, trying to be the aggressor.
 
Our serve receive improved dramatically, bolstered by Casey Foote who passed over a 2.3 for the match. Claire Farrell was awesome for us hitting .321. She provided a lot of offense and much needed points. Heather Pippus was also an energy giver tonight. She was a well we kept going back to and supplied great court leadership Overall, I'm happy the came through in pressure moments and earned the win." – Doyle

Notes
Foote's 26 digs were also a career-high...Farrell has exceeded 10-plus kills in three of her first five collegiate matches…Pippus registered season-highs in kills, digs, points (15.5) and blocks (3)…Freshman Madeleine Bertz achieved a season-best with six blocks…Kemp also recorded 2018-highs in assists and digs (4)…Seekford tallied her most digs (7) this year…The Tribe is now 2-0 in series history against RMU.
 
Up Next
W&M concludes the Hokie Invitational tomorrow against Campbell at 2 pm.