(OMAHA, Ne)—The Mavericks came out of the gates on fire in their quick sweep over Abilene Christian, and they picked up right where they left off in their second match of the day by blanking Idaho State in broom-like fashion behind the stellar day from Isabella Sade.
Both matches during the day were very competitive throughout despite the ending result, and both shared a common theme—Omaha grinding out points late in sets.
Attack errors on the Mavericks part gave Idaho State an early 7-2 lead in set one. Omaha had two key stretches where they put together two 8-0 runs; the first gave the Mavs a 13-8 lead, and the last came at a crucial point. Idaho State was catching steam and cutting into Omaha’s lead, which was 17-16. Then the Mavericks put together a dominant stretch to close out the last eight points and take set one. Sade had three kills in the final eight points, and has averaged 17 kills per match in the Omaha Challenge thus far.
Set two was very familiar to the second set of the Mavs first game of the day, which resulted in a dominant team performance from start to finish. The Mavericks doubled the Bengals in kills, and consistently reaped the rewards of Idaho State’s mistakes. The Bengals had 12 hitting errors over the first two sets alone, which helped Omaha grab set two, 25-17.
Idaho State put together a great effort in the third set. They had 14 kills and had a .267 hitting percentage in that set, comparing to their less than .000 percentage going into it. The set was even at 14, when the Mavs stepped on the throttle behind a flawless finish on the attack. They had four kills and three aces in the final 11-4 stretch that lifted the Mavericks to victory. The Matt Buttermore era starts in flawless fashion, as the Mavs won all six sets they played in today.
Jaclyn Taylor finished with a game-high 34 assists, and Claire Mountjoy tallied 17 digs. Omaha takes on Albany tomorrow at 2 p.m. at Baxter Arena. Albany defeated Abilene Christian, and lost to Idaho State in their two matches in the Omaha Challenge, as Omaha looks to close out the round robin tournament undefeated after tomorrow’s match. You can catch Ben Helwig calling the match live on Mavradio.fm.
