ASHLAND, Ore. – A big second set effort wasn't enough for Oregon Tech, as No. 22-ranked Southern Oregon completed a season sweep of the Lady Owls with a 25-13, 14-25, 25-14, 25-16 win inside Lithia Motors Pavilion.
OIT (11-10, 5-8 CCC) had a huge second set, using a run of 8-1, behind two
Aleksen Thayer blocks and two
Alexa Gugliotta kills to build a 13-6 lead and closed the set with three
Steffini Goss kills in a 7-1 run.
The rest of the night belonged to the Raiders (16-7, 8-5), who held Tech to a .056 hitting percentage – including 19 unforced hitting errors.
The Owls were within 10-9 after a Thayer stuff block in Set 1, but a 10-0 run by SOU blew the frame wide open. In Set 3, Southern scored the final seven points to complete the win and in Set 4, after OIT cut an 8-2 deficit to 15-14, the Raiders completed the win by closing the match on a 10-2 surge.
Tessa Zimmerman and Friley Curtiss had 12 kills to lead the SOU attack.
Goss had 10 kills and both Gugliotta and
Kaliko Schilling had six kills for the Owls. Thayer had a match-high nine blocks,
Taryn Ramsay had 26 assists and
Emma Kness posted 10 digs in the loss for OIT.
Tech closes out the 4-match road swing on Saturday at Warner Pacific.
