Volleyball dominates Liberty

Coming off a weekend that brought it two pivotal conference wins, the VCU volleyball team stepped out of league play Tuesday to battle Liberty for the first of two scheduled matches between the teams this season.

With arguably the most important game of their season to look ahead to, the 17-8 Rams had to battle distraction to avoid a set back against the Flames, who had won nine of 11 coming in, after starting the year 7-5.

“Friday is going to be the biggest game of the season . Every game from here out is huge,” said VCU coach James Finley. “We talked a lot about how good Liberty is . I wanted to make sure that the girls didn’t take this team lightly.”

VCU shot down any idea that it was taking the Flames lightly, rolling over Liberty 3-0 (25-19, 25-22, 25-17) for its third straight win.

The first set began with VCU jumping out to 10-7 lead. However, Liberty answered, storming back with an 8-1 run.

After the run by the Flames, VCU took a timeout and responded to Finley’s challenge, winning 14 of the final 18 points and rolling to a 25-19 first-set victory.

The second set was also a see-saw battle that first saw Liberty jump out to a 9-4 lead before VCU jumped back in the game with an 8-3 run, tying the game at 12.

After Liberty took a 14-13 lead, VCU immediately took its lead back and didn’t surrender it back to Liberty.

The Rams eventually won the set, 25-22, to give them a 2-0 match lead going into the halftime break.

As with anytime it has a 2-0 lead at the break, VCU was looking to keep its intensity up for the third set.

“Our goal is to finish because the third game has always been our weakest game so we were in there thinking, ‘We’re not going to let this happen, we’re going to pick it up the third game and we’re going to finish,'” said senior Ivana Rich (Cumberland/Cumberland H.S.).

With one block in Tuesday night’s match, Rich moves a step closer to the VCU record for blocks in a career with 341. She only needs 10 to pass Jonnie Stone (1987, 89-90) for first all-time.

“It’s really exciting for me; I didn’t expect to do any of this. It’s rewarding to be in that position,” Rich said.

The Rams did not disappoint the fans who turned out to see this one as they steamrolled Liberty 25-17 in the final set after trailing 3-1 early, recording a match-high 70 percent side-out percentage.

Junior Mariel Frey (Lititz, Pa./Manheim Township) led the team with 10 kills and a .429 hitting percentage. Rich and Kelsie Clegg (Boise Idaho/Boise Senior) added eight kills a piece.

Freshman lebaro Marisa Low (Carlsbad, Ca./Carlsbad) led the team with 11 digs and Lenka Melicharkova (Zlin, Czech Republic/U. of Arkansas-Little Rock) recorded 31 assists, nine digs and three blocks.

With the victory, VCU wins its 18th game of the season after going 19-13 in 2008.

The Rams head to Delaware for a battle for the top spot in the conference Friday and go to Towson on Saturday for another CAA match.

If the Rams win the remainder of their games they will win the CAA regular season title for the first time in Finley’s five year tenure at VCU.

“The girls are really focused because they know they are in control of their destiny. If we’re not hosting the tournament here it’s because we didn’t do our job and that’s a fun place to be,” said Finley.