NORFOLK, Va. – Norfolk State held off a late Aggie rally in the fifth set, and the Spartan volleyball team came away with the victory, 3-2, in a tit-for-tat match against North Carolina A&T on Wednesday evening at Gill Gymnasium.
The two teams went back and forth in what was officially a non-conference tilt, with the Spartans winning the first and third sets by scores of 25-23 and 25-21, respectively. The Aggies, meanwhile, won the second and fourth sets by identical 25-19 scores to set up a wild finish to a wild contest.
The Spartans were up by as much as three in that final stanza and only needed two more points to win. The Aggies stormed back to tie it up and force extra points, but NSU finally prevailed by a 17-15 margin to run its overall record to 4-13. N.C. A&T, which had defeated the Spartans at home last week by a 3-0 score, fell to 6-11 on the year.
NSU got big performances from several seniors.
Jessica Johnson led all players with a career-high 22 kills to go along with 11 digs and a pair of blocks.
Dominique Parker also set a career high with 14 kills while adding three blocks. The third of the senior trio,
Sydney Dailey, tied her career best with 10 kills as well.
Parker hit .393 for the match to help the Spartans finish with a .139 team attack percentage.
The Aggies, meanwhile, hit .144. The two squads were so evenly matched that they both finished with 31 attack errors, while NSU had one more kill (53) than A&T (52).
The lead changed five times early in the fourth set, but a couple of late 4-0 runs allowed A&T to pull ahead and force the fifth and deciding set. There, the Spartans got a pair of kills from Johnson and an outstanding play by junior
Clarke Tyler on a solo block to help build a 7-4 lead.
The Aggies called timeout and got to within one several times, but two unforced errors on them put the Spartans ahead 13-10. From there, Samara Brown had a kill and two blocks as A&T won three straight. An error on NSU and a kill by the Aggies kept the set alive when NSU had match serve. But Te'Borah Hawkins was called for a block error, the eighth of the match for the Aggies, and senior
Alex Irizarry finished it off with a service ace right down the middle of the court for the final point.
Irizarry had four aces in the match, and NSU had 10 as a team. Tyler had two of those while adding five kills and four blocks.
Johnson had six kills in the first set, which NSU led 8-5 in the early going. Each team had a 5-0 run, but Johnson had a kill to cap a later 4-1 run and put the Spartans ahead, 18-14. The Spartans found themselves in trouble when the Aggies won three and then four in a row for a one-point advantage. But a block and service ace from NSU on back-to-back plays put the Spartans ahead again, and Johnson finished the set with one last kill.
The Spartans nearly overcame a big early hole in the second set, when A&T won seven of the first 10 points. The Aggies called timeout after an 8-2 run by NSU made it 13-12 in favor of the Spartans. A&T later won seven straight to put the set out of reach.
A&T had nine attack errors in the third set alone, which began with NSU up by two. The Aggies won four straight for a two-point advantage, but the Spartans returned the favor with their own 4-0 run to get that two-point lead back. The Aggies did tie the set at 19-19 after hitting three straight kills, but Dailey's kill ended a 4-0 run for NSU, and one more error on A&T gave the Spartans the 2-1 lead in the match.
Freshman
Jill Aquino handed out a career-high 48 assists, and junior
Melvina Brown posted 21 digs. A&T, though, had four players in double figures and led NSU in digs for the match, 66-55.
The Aggies also had a 13-7 edge in blocks. Jasmine Lindor had eight, while Samara Brown added six and Hawkins contributed five. Brown led the team with 16 kills with 11 digs, and Keniah Rivera had a team-high 17 digs for A&T.
The Spartans also had to overcome a season-high 14 service errors.
NSU will travel across the water to take on Hampton on Friday at HU's Holland Hall beginning at 6 p.m.
