ARCATA - Following its longest road trip of the season, Humboldt State returns home for a pair of California Collegiate Athletic Association affairs against teams from the Bay Area.
After splitting the first two matches and missing a second victory by two points in the fifth set, HSU looks for Lumberjack Arena to be a friendly place to return.
The Lumberjacks will entertain the Pioneers of Cal State East Bay on Thursday and Cal State Monterey Bay on Saturday evening.
Jacks split opening pair
In the first two legs of last week's road trip, HSU fell to one of the hottest teams in the CCAA of Cal Poly Pomona, 3-1, before taking care of CSU Dominguez Hills.
Cal Poly Pomona took control early of the first set and held the Jacks at bay in the second set for 25-15 and 25-16 wins. Following intermission, HSU led a majority of the third set before Courtney Debrunner and Kaitlyn Dunaway lined kills to record a 25-22 total.
The Jacks held a pair of four-point leads in the fourth set, before four ties were on the board. Then the Broncos completed the win with two final kills and a 26-24 score.
On Friday night, HSU went out to a two-set lead, before taking away a 3-1 victory over host CSU Dominguez Hills to complete the season sweep.
Growth of HSU program shows at LA
The growth of the Humboldt State volleyball team was no more evident than on Saturday night.
After dropping the opening two sets, HSU made a furious comeback to take the next two sets, 25-15 and 25-17.
Tied at 13 in the fifth set, host Cal State Los Angeles, however, killed the next point and a HSU hitting error gave it the 15-13 contest to escape with the 3-2 match.
It was the second near HSU win against Cal State Los Angeles with both being 3-2 finals.
Coach Wood's comments on last week:
"After going 1-2 last week on our southern California trip, we are ready to be home this week. We felt like we ended the week well, when we put up a great battle against Cal State LA. We had some missed opportunities in that back and forth fifth set that prevented us from getting the win in the end. The biggest lesson that we learned from that close match was that we are capable of competing with the top teams in this conference when we play hard and we play as a team. Cal State LA is a very good team, and we were right with them the entire way."
Double-digit wins claimed by Jacks
For the first time in seven years, Humboldt State has claimed volleyball victories in at least 10 matches.
With the four-set win at CSU Dominguez Hills last Friday night, HSU won its 10th match. The 10 wins are the first time the program has hit double figures in the win column since finishing 10-16 in the fall of 2007.
One more Jacks win will be the most over the past nine years as they were 13-13 for the 2005 campaign.
HSU can also have its most CCAA victories since first joining the league over the past five years. The Jacks stand at 5-9 and were 5-17 two years ago. The program recorded a 7-13 mark in its first year in the CCAA for 2008.
Hasenstab has quality week
After a bit of a rough middle of the season, freshman Alex Hasenstab had a quality road week.
The middle blocker swung .280 over the team's three matches. Hasenstab hit 26 kills with five errors in 75 total attacks. She added seven digs, three solo blocks and six block assists.
Alex had eight kills, three digs and three total blocks at Cal Poly Pomona. She followed with nine kills, .304 hitting, a dig and two blocks assists versus CSU Dominguez Hills, before her best match of nine kills, .471 hitting percentage, three digs, two solo blocks and two block assists at Cal State Los Angeles.
Owen & Renshaw in CCAA ranks
The pair of Ashley Owen and Kelci Renshaw sit in the top five of the CCAA individual stat ranks.
Owen stayed at fourth in kills with 305 with Renshaw also in fourth, but in aces per set (0.37)
Coach Wood's comments on this week:
"We are very optimistic about this upcoming week as we prepare for our matchups vs. East Bay and Monterey. We beat East Bay last time in 4 sets, but we are not expecting an easy win when we face them again. They recently beat SSU, and they are a team that can be very dangerous, they have great athletes on their team.
Saturday we face Monterey who beat us the first time around when we played at their place. They are another very athletic team with excellent outside hitters and a very good libero. We didn't play our best match against them last time, and we need to execute much better this weekend than we did last time."
HSU's CCAA 7th weekend home action foes...
vs. Cal State East Bay (7-14/3-10 CCAA)
(Thur. at 7 p.m. at Lumberjack Arena)
Series History: HSU leads 38-16
Last meeting: HSU won 3-1 at Hayward on Sept. 28 -- (25-21, 25-20, 22-25, 25-20) CSUEB was led by 11 kills from Hannah Bell, Samantha Bruno and Suzy Ni Xu ... HSU received a big game of 12 kills, 23 digs, 2 assists, 2 aces and 2 block assists from Kaitlyn Dunaway with Courtney Debrunner hitting .571 with 8 kills
*Last HSU win: last meeting
*Coached by Jim Spagle in his 18th season
*Pioneers have dropped their last three matches and nine of the past 10 contests
*Went 0-2 last week by a 3-0 final at Chico State and 3-1 score at Cal State Stanislaus
*Not claimed a road win in eight matches
*In last 10 matches, Pioneers have went 9-29
*Veronica Sanchez is 2nd in CCAA with 5.11 digs per set & 4th in digs (383)
*Suzy Ni Xu leads the team with 215 kills
*Samantha Bruno has the top hitting percentage at .267 and 105 kills
*Kitona Offord has 52 total blocks and 146 kills
vs. Cal State Montery Bay (13-8/7-6 CCAA)
(Sat. at 7 p.m. in Lumberjack Arena)
Series History: CSUMB leads 7-4
Last meeting: CSUMB won 3-1 on Sept. 27 in Seaside -- (23-25, 16-25, 27-25, 18-25) Symone Hayden downed 17 kills and dug 11 digs for HSU, while Kaitlyn Dunaway had 13 digs and 12 kills ... CSUMB had a big night from Julie Ashen with 25 kills and 12 digs, along with 14 kills and 16 digs from Jessica Malcolm
*Last HSU win: 3-2 in Arcata on Nov. 3, 2012
*Coached by 7th-year coach Jody Gerry
*Split last four matches including dropping a 3-1 match at Cal State Stanislaus, before edging Chico State, 3-2, after being down 2-0
*Went 2-4 after having a five-match win streak
*Otters lead CCAA as a team in kills (1209), assists (1118), digs (1609) and digs per set (18.08)
*Julia Ashen is 1st in CCAA for kills per set (4.68) and 2nd in kills (370) with Jessical Malcolm 3rd in kills (324)
*Kelsey Johnson rates 3rd in league for assists per set (10.38)
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