University of Tennessee
8-15, 1-8SEC
Ole Miss
18-5, 4-5SEC
UT Swings Past Ole Miss in Sunday Sweep
October 26, 2014 | Volleyball
Oct. 26, 2014
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. -- Behind a match-high 11 kills from Ashley Mariani and a double-double from Kanisha Jimenez, Tennessee swept its way past Ole Miss, 3-0 (25-19, 25-20, 25-22), Sunday at Thompson-Boling Arena to claim its first SEC victory of the season.
Jimenez finished with 10 kills and 10 digs to snare her fourth double-double of the season, tying her for the team lead in the category with setter Lexi Dempsey. Dempsey finished with a match-high 41 assists, adding seven digs along the way, while Raina Hembry helped UT control the net with seven block assists on the afternoon.
"I was very excited with how the whole team played," said Tennessee head coach Rob Patrick. "We've been having some very good practices and in the past the things we've been getting better at in practice haven't been translating to the matches. But today it finally came together. I was very happy with how Lexi played and then our back row play was pretty good. And then we really affected them at the net with our block."
Also turning in a big performance was middle blocker Shealyn Kolosky. The senior slammed nine kills on 12 swings with just one error for a career-best attack percentage of .667.
As a team, UT swung .291 -- its best mark of the season -- while limiting the Rebels to .128. Tennessee came away with nine total team blocks against five from Ole Miss.
Kelsey Bawcombe had nine kills and five digs, doing her offensive damage at a .308 clip. Meanwhile, Megan Hatcher -- making her second start of the season at libero -- came away with a match-high 12 digs.
The Lady Vols got four kills from Jimenez and three apiece from the duo of Bawcombe and Turner as it rode a .310 hitting percentage to a 25-19, first-set win. Dempsey handed out 13 assists and UT committed only four errors on the attack compared to 11 from its Ole Miss counterpart. For the set, the Rebels swung just .054, putting down 13 kills on 37 swings. As a team, Tennessee posted four total blocks in the frame, getting a trio of block assists from Hembry and Jimenez.
The Lady Vols broke an early, 5-5 deadlock in the frame with a 5-0 run that featured back-to-back kills from Turner. UT would not relinquish the advantage from there, leading by as many as seven before weathering a late Ole Miss flurry to secure the match-opening win.
Trailing early to start set two, Tennessee used a big, 7-1 run to take control of the frame. Back-to-back combined blocks featuring Hembry and Dempsey got the rally started and five kills for Mariani over the next six points sustained it. Mariani would go on to finish the set with seven kills.
UT kept its foot on the accelerator from there, taking the advantage to nine at 19-10 after Hembry put down a kill before teaming up with Dempsey for a block assist. The lead grew to double digits at 21-11 before Ole Miss used an 8-2 run to battle back to within four at 23-19 and keep the set in the balance. But a couple kills from Kolosky -- her third and fourth of the frame -- finally put the set away for the Lady Vols by a 25-20 score line.
There was nothing to separate the two sides throughout the early portion of the third set as Tennessee and Ole Miss teeter-tottered all the way to a 15-15 tie. It was the home team that finally gained the upper hand, piecing together a short, 3-0 rally behind two kills from Mariani and a Rebel attack error to take the lead at 18-15.
The next two points went the way of Ole Miss, cutting the lead to just one, but a setter dump from Dempsey and a kill from Jimenez sparked another 3-0 spurt that put the Lady Vols ahead 21-18. Again, the visitors were able to climb back to within a single point at 21-20, but kills from Kolosky and Bawcombe promptly put UT back in control at 23-20 -- a margin that would hold true when Bawcombe delivered the final point of the match, giving UT a 25-22 win in the third set.
Tennessee hits the road for its first midweek affair of the SEC season when it travels to Lexington to face 16th ranked Kentucky in a nationally televised match on ESPNU. The Wildcats won the first meeting between the two programs this season, topping UT 3-0 in Knoxville on Oct. 10.
