NCAA Volleyball Regionals : Morton Leads SDSU to a Victory Over UCSB

SAN DIEGO — Kris Morton, a 6-foot 4-inch sophomore middle blocker, had nine fourth-game kills to lead San Diego State’s women’s volleyball team to a 15-11, 15-8, 8-15, 15-11 win over UC Santa Barbara in the first round of the NCAA Northwest Regional tournament Saturday in Peterson Gym.

San Diego State (37-8) will meet University of Pacific in the second round Friday. Pacific, which knocked San Diego State out of the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. tournament after SDSU beat Santa Barbara two weeks ago, has defeated the Aztecs in all three of their meetings this year.

San Diego State fell behind 3-0 in the first game. But after scoring the next five points for a 5-3 lead it never relinquished, SDSU looked as if it would make quick work of Santa Barbara (24-12). San Diego State jumped ahead 11-0 in the second game and coasted for a 2-0 lead in games.

However, in the third game, Santa Barbara, behind all-PCAA outside hitter Charlotte Mitchel and Shari Rogers, changed the momentum, with a 15-8 win.

That’s when the Aztecs went to Morton, who had eight kills to that point in the match.

Setter Liane Sato and Morton began to get ahead of the Santa Barbara blocking scheme by working a quick-set play for what Morton calls a “slam dink.” Sato would set the ball just atop the net and Morton would slam it down before the Santa Barbara blocking could get set up. “We tried to establish the middle attack,” San Diego State coach Rudy Suwara said. “We felt we had to get the ball to the middle before they got their block set up.”

That play worked for nine kills in the final game, as SDSU outscored UCSB 13-2 in the second half of the game.

It was the third time in four meetings that fifth-ranked SDSU has defeated 10th-ranked UCSB. It was a matchup Suwara felt shouldn’t have occurred this early in the tournament.

“It’s just a disgrace to have to play a team like that in the first round,” Suwara said. “Especially when Southwest Texas State is playing Texas Arlington. Those are teams that haven’t been ranked all year.”

Despite having to play Pacific, the nation’s top-ranked team, Suwara feels the Aztecs can win.

“We gotta feel like this is our turn to win,” Suwara said. “We’re going to have to come up with a prime effort to beat them.”

In other action:

Hawaii 3, USIU 0--Suzanne Eagye, a Point Loma High graduate, scored 12 kills last Friday night to lead No. 3 Hawaii to a 15-5, 15-4, 15-8 victory over United States International University in the first round of the Northwest Regional at Hawaii. Hawaii will travel to San Jose State for next Friday’s second-round match. It was USIU’S first volleyball postseason appearance.

The UCLA women’s volleyball team, an up-and-down group for most of the season, went down and out of the NCAA playoffs Saturday night in a stunning upset.

Unranked Loyola Marymount, coming back after losing the first two games and trailing, 7-2, in the fifth, gave the seventh-ranked Bruins their quickest playoff exit ever with a dramatic 1-15, 9-15, 15-8, 15-12, 16-14 victory before a crowd of 1,153 at UCLA’s Wooden Center.

It was one case where seeing didn’t necessarily mean believing.

“It probably didn’t happen,” UCLA Coach Andy Banachowski said afterwards, hoping it was all just a nightmare.

For Loyola, the WCAC champion with a 24-7 record, it’s on to Provo, Utah, for the West Regionals Thursday against Stanford.