Coming off a weekend split at home, SVSU’s women’s volleyball team was confident heading into a second straight weekend of home matches.
However, the team dropped both its matches over the weekend, 3-1 against Northwood on Friday, Sept. 29, and 3-0 to Ferris State on Saturday, Sept. 30.
Despite the losses, SVSU head coach Will Stanton is encouraged by the improvements the team is making in GLIAC play.
“We are hoping to continue the progress we have been making on our competitiveness and our ability to battle for whole games and matches,” he said. “We have had to make several adjustments to our lineup for various reasons over the last few weeks, and the girls have shown great resilience and tenacity in their spirit and effort.”
Despite the lineup inconsistency, the players remained confident heading into the weekend set.
“Our confidence has definitely been restored and we felt good going into the weekend,” sophomore captain Rachel Eisenhour said. “We’re figuring out how to play our game and be successful with it.”
Against Northwood, SVSU took an early lead and won the first set 25-20. During the first set, junior setter Lindsey Jacob helped SVSU gain the lead, earning four consecutive points with her serves. From there, the Timberwolves rattled off three straight set wins, 26-24, 25-18 and 25-18.
The weekend concluded with a 3-0 loss to GLIAC-leading Ferris State, which is ranked No. 8 in the country and improved to 13-2 on the season with the win over SVSU.
Ferris overpowered the Lady Cardinals in the first set en route to a 25-12 win. During the second set, Saginaw Valley started aggressively and jumped out to a 5-3 lead before the Bulldogs bounced back and won the set 25-13. FSU ran away in the third set with a 25-11 win.
To start off October, the Cardinals (3-12) will travel to Purdue Northwest on Friday, Oct. 6, for a 7 p.m. match and to Davenport on Saturday, Oct. 7, for a 2 p.m. contest.
