PRAIRIE VIEW, Texas - HBU ran a balanced and efficient attack, hitting .422 as a team, led by a trio of players with eight kills and two more with seven, as the Huskies cruised past Prairie View A&M, 3-0 (25-17, 25-15, 25-11) in non-conference volleyball Tuesday night at the William Nicks Building.
Junior outside hitter
Mikayla Vivens hit .438, sophomore outside hitter
Kelly Colwell hit .500 and freshman right side
Anna Gadway hit .400 as each had eight kills for the Huskies (3-1). Colwell added eight digs and Gadway had three blocks. Sophomore middle blocker
Ebonie Ballesteros posted seven kills and four blocks and junior middle blocker
Megan Patillo also had seven kills. Junior setter
Morgan Dewyer recorded 34 assists, three kills and a pair of aces, while senior libero
Hannah Lewis came up with 14 digs.
Colwell and Vivens led the team with 16 attacks apiece, Patillo and Gadway each had 15 and Ballesteros took advantage of her 11, hitting .545.
Victoria Pearson led the Panters (0-4) with nine kills and Cetera Carter had eight. Jakarta Hope had 14 assists and Skyla Childs led PVAMU defensively with 14 digs.
The Huskies had 41 kills to the Panthers' 26 and held them to a .160 hitting percentage. HBU outdug PVAMU, 37-28, outlblocked them, 6.5-1.0, and outaced them, 8-2.
The Panthers led 8-7 in the first, but the Huskies went on a four-point run, capped by a Ballesteros-Dewyer block. PVAMU was able to close within a point after one of its two aces on the night, but HBU answered by scoring the next three, the last on another block by Ballesteros, to lead, 15-11. Still leading at 17-14, the Huskies took command by ripping off five-straight points, then sophomore middle blocker
Jada Allen put it away for a 25-17 win.
HBU took a 6-5 lead in the second and never relinquished it and the last time PVAMU got within one was at 9-8. Leading 16-11, the Huskies scored four in a row to lead by nine. Ballesteros had the decisive kill for a 25-15 victory.
Ballesteros and Lewis each had an ace as the Huskies scored six of the first seven points of the third. Continuing to lead by five at 11-6, HBU scored the next four to extended the advantage to nine. A kill by Carter closed the gap to 17-11, but that would be the last point of the match for PVAMU, as the Huskies closed it out with an 8-0 run that included a pair of aces by freshman setter
Ellie Wipf and a kill by Colwell on match point.
HBU faces Ole Miss, Tulane and Missouri State in the Allstate Sugar Bowl Volleyball Classic Friday and Saturday in New Orleans, before returning home to host Rice next Tuesday.
