Final Stats

ANNAPOLIS, Md. â€"â€" A strong hitting night keyed the Navy volleyball team to a three-set victory over Loyola Saturday night at the Wesley A. Brown Field House in Annapolis. The Mids (11-3, 1-0 Patriot League) outhit the Greyhounds (6-9, 0-2) comfortably in each set of their 25-18, 25-15, 25-21 victory.

"I thought the team had great energy," said Navy head coach Larry Bock. "That carried a lot of momentum through each of the three sets. Loyola is way better (than last year). That's a much improved team, which is the same thing we set about them last year. They served the heck out of the ball. I think our team was really serious about wanting to play well in what was both our first match at home in a while and our first league match. There is no question they were real ready for this. They were tuned in all week at practice."

Navy controlled the opening set of the match. The Mids jumped out to leads of 3-0, 7-2, 10-3 and 15-8 to cruise to the victory in the first stanza.

Loyola took an early 7-4 lead at the start of the second set only to see Navy tie the score at 7-7 and 9-9. The score would again be knotted at 13-13 before a quick 3-0 run by the Mids gave them a 16-13 advantage and result in the Greyhounds using the second of their two available timeouts. Loyola scored immediately after the stoppage in play, but would not score again until a Navy service error made the score 24-15.

Navy raced out to leads of 5-0 and 7-2 at the start of the third set. Loyola slowly crept back into the set as the margin was down to as few as two points at 9-7, 10-8, 11-9 and 14-12. Tara Dotzauer (Sr., Raleigh, N.C.) produced back-to-back kills for Navy, then the tandem of Maggie Phillips (Sr., Leesburg, Va.) and Sofia Hruby (Jr., Austin, Texas) combined for a block that gave the Mids a 19-14 lead.

The Greyhounds again responded and the difference between the teams returned to as few as two points at 19-17 and 20-18. A bad set on the Loyola side of the court was followed by a service ace from Olivia Kluger (Sr., Carmel, Ind.) to make the score 22-18 and cause Loyola to burn its second timeout. Maddi Sgattoni (Fr., Pittsburgh, Pa.) answered with a kill after the break to increase the Navy lead to five points, which was enough for the Mids to play sideout volleyball the remainder of the set.

Navy had a great hitting night as it finished the match with an overall hitting percentage of .317. The Mids totaled hitting percentages of .286, .324 and .344, respectively, in the three sets.

"I thought Patricia Mattingly (Jr., New Albany, Ind.) was very, very good tonight," said Bock. "She was putting the ball on a tee for our hitters. Katie Patrick (Jr., Aurora, Colo.) and Patricia got the whole match started where Patricia was just finding Katie all over the place. That set the tone.

"What Patricia also did real well tonight was serve the ball. She has always been a good server, but this was a whole new level. She started a lot of different runs for us with her serve."

Navy's defense also slowed down the Loyola offense. The Greyhounds were limited to 29 kills (Navy had 41) and an overall hitting percentage of .088. The Mids ended the night with 10 blocks (five in set three) and 46 digs, while the Greyhounds accrued just one block and 45 digs.

"What Loyola did so well was serve tough," said Bock. "We were out of system a good portion of the match, and that wasn't because of poor passing; it was because of how well Loyola served. We were able to get through that and work back into system, and doing so will only help us down the road."

Dotzauer led the Navy offense with 12 kills and just two errors on 24 attempts (.417), with both Sgattoni and Patrick totaling seven kills without an attack error on a combined 38 swings.

Sydney Shearn (Jr., Louisville, Ky.) grabbed 20 digs on the night to lead the Navy passers.

Navy will be back on the court in the Wesley A. Brown Field House Tuesday when the Mids play host to four-time Patriot League Tournament champion American. First serve is slated for 7:35 p.m.