The Marquette volleyball team celebrated more than a victory at the Al McGuire Center Saturday night as graduate student Hope Werch made history.
Werch became the program’s all-time leader in career aces during the Golden Eagles’ straight set sweep (25-10, 25-18, 25-14) over the Providence Friars. The record was previously held by Christina Norgle with 177 career aces.
“It was pretty cool,” Werch said. “We’ve had that banner up for a couple weeks so it’s been something that when it came to my attention that I was close, that ‘woah, I could actually do something kind of cool.’ Tonight I was like ‘tonight’s got to be the night, I’ve got to do it at home’ and I’m just glad that I was able to do it.”
Marquette head coach Ryan Theis said he couldn’t be more proud of Werch.
“Couldn’t be a greater person on the top of that leaderboard, just a wonderful Marquette person, wonderful family. Thrilled to see her on top,” Theis said.
Marquette jumped out to a 10-2 lead in the first set, forcing Providence to call a timeout.
Coming out of the timeout, the Golden Eagles continued to dominate in the set. Redshirt sophomore Megan Lund ended the frame with a kill to win the set 25-10.
“It was just fun. Lundy comes out and busts her butt everyday,” Theis said. “Just incredibly lovable, great person, so it was fun for everybody.”
Graduate student Savannah Rennie had six kills in the first set as Marquette would outhit Providence .341 to .103.
Similarly to the first set, Marquette opened set two to an early lead. However, Providence would battle back to bring it to with one at multiple points; but that would be as close as they’d get. Werch would end the frame with a kill to give Marquette the 25-18 set win.
In the final set, the Friars tied the frame at nine apiece after the Golden Eagles started it on a 3-0 run. Then Marquette would respond with a 7-0 run to break the frame open before first-year Jenna Reitsma completed the sweep for the Golden Eagles taking the set 25-14.
“I think with us just being an older team it takes quite a bit to rattle us,” Werch said. “I thought that just because they may have gotten an ace or two we didn’t let that necessarily bother us and I think that’s what helped us kind of just say no more, let’s separate, we’re done.”
Redshirt first-year Carsen Murray ended the match with a career high 13 kills.
“It was great, we just wanted to keep feeding her,” Theis said. “That was kinda the game plan going in and she handled it well.”
Alongside Murray, Werch and Rennie contributed nine kills a piece on the night.
Marquette (19-4,10-2 BIG EAST) will now begin a four-game road trip. First up for the Golden Eagles will be a trip to South Orange, New Jersey to face Seton Hall Friday at 5 p.m. CST.
“Their offense got on us a little bit last time so we gotta be a little bit defensively against them,” Theis said. “We got to get a little bit better in transition.”
This article was written by Ben Schultz. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @benschultz52.
