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Syracuse women’s volleyball (12-0, 0-0 Atlantic Coast Conference) fended off Cornell (6-3, 0-0 Ivy League) to win its 12th game in a row. For the second straight game, SU had fewer digs, kills and assists than its opponent, but still managed to prevail and keep its undefeated record.

Syracuse put up points coming from a variety of ways. The Orange had four different players record nine or more kills. Five out of the eight non-liberos who played recorded 18 or more total attacks in a balanced offensive effort.

“Going into the match our game plan was to attack their setter and attack the right side of the defense, attack (Cornell’s Eliza Konvicka) on defense,” SU head coach Bakeer Ganesharatnam said postgame. “And then attacking the setter so we could prevent them running (their offense) in the middle.”

His strategy paid off. Cornell recorded nine receiving errors, including three from Konvicka, who had the worst receiving percentage in the game. Syracuse, on the other hand, only had six receiving errors.

Errors were a big part of the game as Syracuse capitalized off of 27 errors by Cornell, compared to 19 from the Orange.

“Every team has service errors because, again, like coach said, we’re trying to serve tough so if we get a few errors and we’re able to pull out a win, I’m OK with that,” Syracuse’s Sydney Moore said postgame.

Moore, a graduate transfer from Cornell, was a big part of the Orange’s attack today, attacking on nearly 18% of plays. Moore recorded nine kills and three block assists versus her former team.

Syracuse’s attack came from everywhere: through the middle, from deep and from the left and right. SU also succeeded in using finesse instead of power for many of its kills. Setter Veronica Sierzant recorded four kills (a season-high), each one catching Cornell completely off guard.

“I thought we had a pretty good scouting report, you know, exposing some of the things Cornell would do and taking advantage of it,” Ganesharatnam said. “I thought throughout the match, we made some adjustments based on what Cornell was doing.”

Syracuse also took advantage of plenty of free balls, as middle blockers Klara Zarnovicka and Anastasiia Nikolnikova feasted on gifts from Cornell. Zarnovicka and Nikolnikova both had 10 kills and combined for 10 block assists.

“I thought (Cornell was) going to attack us a lot in the middle, which we wanted to prevent (Cornell) from serving tough and then also running our middles on the other side,” Ganesharatnam said.

Syracuse was sharp from the serving line recording nine aces with only four errors in the afternoon. SU ranks fifth in aces per set in the nation and first in the ACC as of Friday. Syracuse went from 1.4 aces per set last year to 2.39. Ganesharatnam believes in serving aggressively, which has certainly paid off.

“I personally think it’s more important to be aggressive with the serve and not to worry about the serving errors too much. I think you can take that team out of their system with a good serve, and it’s worth the risk you take as long as the serve is good,” Ganesharatnam said.

Published on September 22, 2024 at 7:03 pm

Contact Aidan: aidan.tseng@gmail.com