No. 23 Volleyball Falls Short at No. 12 FSU
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Sophomore Savanah Leafcollected a match-high 18 kills, but No. 23 Miami volleyball fell at No. 12Florida State Friday, 3-1, in the Atlantic Coast Conference title match atTully Gym. The Hurricanes and Seminoles split the season series for the third-straightyear.
UMwraps up the regular season 25-5 overall and 17-3 for a second-place finish inthe ACC. The 17 conference wins set a new program record. FSU improved to 27-3and 18-2 to complete the regular season undefeated at home, winning the ACC forthe fourth time.
Leaf,who transferred to Miami after a season at San Jose State, had a season-high 18kills to go with 11 digs for her third double-double of the season. ClassmateEmani Sims hit .348 in the match on 12 kills, adding nine blocks for the Canes.
JuniorTaylor Hollins and sophomore Alexis Mourning each had 11 kills. Senior setterNrithya Sundararaman recorded 47 assists to go with nine digs and four kills.
Defensively,four players had double-digit digs for UM, with Hollins and juniors AlexJohnson and Ryan Shaffer all having 12 in the match. Hollins now has ateam-high 17 double-doubles on the year.
AfterFlorida State took the opening set, Miami responded in the second by going up16-9. The Seminoles fought to within two several times, including at 24-22, butSims put down a kill in the middle of the court to tie the match at one. It wasthe first time since Sept. 30 that a visiting team won a set at Tully Gym.
FSUreversed the momentum in the third set to win convincingly, 25-14, going up 2-1in the match. Once again, the Canes battled back in the following set to take a10-6 advantage on a kill by Hollins. The teams then went back-and-forth withthe Seminoles eventually evening it out at 20. Following an exchange of pointsto make it 21-21, UM took the next three to make it 24-21. However, theSeminoles rallied to tie it at 24 and avoided two more set points to win,29-27.
TheHurricanes will now wait to find out their seeding in the NCAA Tournament,which starts next weekend at campus sites. ESPNU will televise the selectionshow Sunday at 4 p.m.
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