Eagles falter at home, shine on the road

This archived article was written by: Josh Luke

The College of Eastern Utah volleyball team was in action last Wednesday at the BDAC against Western Wyoming. Coach Brent Martindale said, “This was the worst that the team has played all year; we didn’t play very well on defense and we didn’t play much offence either.” He also said that the team made errors on both sides of the ball. Summing it up he said, “It wasn’t a very good showing. The scores were 12-30, 17-30, 30-18, and 21-30. He said that this was extremely bad because they played a much closer game with conference powerhouse Southern Idaho.
Coach Martindale said that even with this bad showing against Western Wyoming there were a couple bright spots on the team. Amy Warburton led the team with 13 kills and he said that Megan Hunsaker played well.
The team was also in action this last weekend at the Santa Anna Invitational in California. The team did much better at this tournament with a team record of 5-1. He said that after the game against Western Wyoming earlier in the week this was a big improvement.
The team played in pool play for the first three games. In pool play, teams play the best out of three games, with the first two games going to 25 and if needed the third and deciding game going to 15.
The first game they played was against Hancock College from southern California. They played very well and won by the score of 25-18, 25-17. The second game they played was against the host Santa Anna College. They played very well again winning the game 25-20, 19-25, 15-11. They then played in the third and final game in pool play. In this game they played Yuba College from Northern California. The team again played very well winning easily 25-20, 25-20, which meant that they had won their pool.
Since they won their pool they went onto the Quarterfinals. There was a random draw before this started and CEU was seated third. In playoff games at this tournament teams play only one game, where the first one to 30 wins and moves on. In their quarterfinal game they played Rio-Hondo College from Southern California. Coach Martindale said that this was a very tough game but the team played well and won 30-28.
After winning their quarterfinal game they moved onto the semi-finals where the random draw put them up against Coast College. Martindale said that Coast College was the best team in California last year, not to mention the top seed this year. He said that the team got off to a very slow start in the game starting the game 9-1. The team never could catch up loosing the game 22-30.
In their final game in this tournament the team was playing in the third and fourth place game. The played against Glendale College and won easily 30-14. “The team played very well in this game against a pretty tough team said Martindale.
The team has placed third in this tournament for the last three years according to Coach Martindale. He said that he thought the team played very well in this tournament and that he was proud of them for playing very well. He also said that Amy Warburton lead the team in kills again, and also that Cassidy Dawes, Kelsey Wells, Magan Webb, Megan Hunsaker, and Brittney Bentley all contributed to the success of the team. He also said that the setters on the team did very well.
The team play’s at Westminster College Wednesday, September 22nd, and again Friday, Sept. 24th against Salt Lake at the BDAC starting at seven p.m. The team has only 12 matches left and hope for a large turnout Friday.