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Junior
Heather Laudato records one of her match-high
11 digs for The Beach against Liberty on
Friday night in The Pyramid. • Yulian
Danusastro / Daily Forty-Niner
49ers
sweep through weekend, upset No. 24 Utah
Wendalyn
Lazarte
Daily Forty-Niner
Staff Writer
Expectations
were met and maturity level went up for
the women’s volleyball team over the
weekend.
The
49ers defeated three opponents starting
with Northeastern University Wednesday,
Liberty University Friday and on Saturday
night, sent 24th-ranked Utah home with its
first loss of the season.
The
49ers finished its perfect weekend by beating
the Utah Utes in four sets (29-31, 30-21,
30-24 and 30-27) at The Pyramid.
"I
think we matured in one night," Mariko
Crum, a sophomore from Phoenix Arizona said.
"And we were able to right our level
of play from mediocre to where it is now.
And now that we know how we should be able
to play every single game, we can get really
good and excel."
49er
setter Jillian Mazzarella said the team’s
defense has gotten better, and the game
against Utah was the most competitive one
of the weekend.
"This
team is a lot bigger. The other night [Liberty]
didn’t hit the ball hard," Mazzarella
said. "This team did."
"[Utah]
played a good game, you can’t take
that away from them," Crum said.
The
Beach had to change to a new lineup because
of a nagging shoulder injury to Erika Chidester,
who was the outside hitter and middle blocker
of the game Wednesday night.
Head
coach Brian Gimmillaro said for two and
a half weeks the team thought Chidester
would be able to play.
Gimmillaro
said if he had known the predicament Chidester
was in, he would have had a new lineup at
the beginning of the season.
The
49ers dominated its match Friday sending
Liberty packing in three games (30-20, 30-
20, 30-14).
Robin
Miramontes, who had 11 kills in the match,
was confident the team would defeat Liberty.
"I
knew we would win," Miramontes said.
"But I knew that it would take us coming
together and play[ing] a really good game."
Even
though the 49ers won in three, Gimmillaro
still saw room for improvement.
"We
made too many mistakes," Gimmillaro
said. "And I think they are capable
of not making too many of those mistakes."
The
season opener for the 49ers came Wednesday
against Northeastern. The 49ers did not
look great, but won the match in five sets
(30-23, 26-30, 26-30, 34-32, 15-6).
"It
wasn’t their game it was ours,"
Crum said. "[Northeastern] didn’t
do anything that made us play bad, we made
us play bad."
Mazzarella
said she did not expect the game to go five
sets until the third set of the night.
Miramontes
said after the first set the players relaxed
a little, but during the second and third
set the team got tense.
"At
the fourth [set] we became really aggressive
and went out," Miramontes said. "We
definitely had the momentum and the crowd
was really loud."
The
49ers will now prepare for its upcoming
match against Yale on Saturday at 7 p.m.
in The Pyramid.
"We
have a whole week of practice to develop
a setter, something we didn't get a chance
to practice," Crum said. "And
this whole new lineup would give us an opportunity
to play some crazy plays that nobody does,
but Long Beach."
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