Volleyball Team Drops Match to Caldwell

The University of the Sciences women's volleyball team saw their modest two-game winning streak snapped Saturday evening as Caldwell College defeated the Devils 3-0 at the Bobby Morgan Arena. 

The Cougars  took the match with scores of 25-20, 25-19, and 25-20.  The loss, just Sciences second in their last five matches, evens the Devils record at 5-5 overall and drops their Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference mark to 3-4 overall.  The Cougars improve to 11-3 overall and a league best 8-0 as they maintain first place in the CACC Northern division. 

Seniors Christine Puschak and Cady Rich combined for 14 of the Devils 23 kills with Puschak leading the way with eight.  Puschak also added two aces and three blocks while Rich recorded five blocks in the match.   Freshman Diana Solomon led Sciences with 13 assists.  Defensively, sophomores Stacey Wooden and Sheryse Taylor had 17 and 10 digs respectively. 

Caldwell was led by Kasey Bausch and Cory Roesing.  Bausch had nine kills while Roesing added eight.    Lauren Roth had 20 assists setting up the Cougar offense while Maddy Amon did the defensive work with 18 digs.  Bausch also added three blocks. 

The Cougars scored four of the first five points in the opening set to lead 4-1 before the Devils rallied with four straight points to take a 5-4 lead.  Neither team pulled away over the next several rallies and later in the set when the Cougars ran off four straight points to break a 14-14 tie and lead 18-14.  Caldwell later increased their lead to six 24-18 before taking the set 25-20. 

The Devils jumped out to an early 9-7 lead in the second set, scoring five of their nine points while serving.  Caldwell battled back with an 11-5 spurt to take an 18-14 lead and later increased the margin to seven 24-17.  Sciences added two more points before an attack error gave Caldwell a 2-0 lead in the match with a 25-19 set 2 win. 

An 8-0 run by the Cougars turned an early two point lead into a six point deficit, 16-10 midway through the match.  The Devils closed the gap to 117-15 and but could come no closer.  The Cougars led 22-20 before scoring the final three points of the match to complete the three set sweep. 

The Devils return to action on Wednesday October 6, 2010 when they face off against Holy Family University in northeast Philadelphia.