As her team rushed the court to celebrate, Terrapin women’s volleyball coach Janice Kruger grabbed a microphone and thanked the crowd of 1,321 at Comcast Center Friday.
The crowd spilled onto the court, surrounding the Terps in a sea of arms waving pens and posters for autographs. And on the floor, off to the side, sat a quiet North Carolina squad whose bid to take over first place in the ACC had been denied by an unyielding Terp performance.
The Terps (20-1, 11-1 ACC) gained sole possession of the conference lead with a 3-1 (30-17, 25-30, 30-20, 30-24) win over the Tar Heels, who entered the match tied with the Terps with just one ACC loss.
The Tar Heels (14-7, 9-2) also entered the match with an ACC-leading 20.57 digs per game and arguably the best defense in the ACC, a reputation they backed early in game one.
Jade Brown, the Terps’ dominant sophomore outside hitter, was uncharacteristically rejected to start the game. Then, senior Rachel Wagener’s usually end-all, laserlike slam was somehow dug off the floor. One after another, the Terps fired their tried and true weapons to no avail against the stingy Heels.
“It was very frustrating,” Brown said. “I was like, ‘What do I have to do to get the kill?'”
But led by senior Stephanie Smith’s six kills and three blocks, the Terps rebounded for a 30-17 win in game one. Slowly, the Terps began finding other ways to score, including a technique Brown called “tooling” the opposing front row.
In this strategy, the Terp front line baited the Carolina blockers to go up for the block, and rather than hitting above or around the block, the Terps aimed for the blockers’ arms in hopes of deflecting the ball out of bounds.
The technique worked and, combined with solid digging by senior Stephanie Doiron (24 digs) and freshman Maggie Schmelzle (19 digs) in the back, allowed the Terps to match Carolina at its own defensive game. The Terps had 73 digs to the Tar Heels’ 72.
The Terps made quick work of the Wolfpack (7-12, 1-10) in a 3-0 (30-20, 30-22, 30-14) victory yesterday. Wagener and Smith both turned in 11 kills, leading the Terps to the 20-win plateau for the season. Still, it was the team’s 19th win Friday that was the most crucial.
“[Carolina] was definitely our biggest match,” Schmelzle said. “It’s all you thought about all week. Going to class, it was all you thought about.”
Contact reporter Jason Fraley at fraleydbk@gmail.com.
