ByTim MiguelSenior Staff Writer
Whenever a team has an up-and-down season the best thing it can dois finish strong during the stretch drive to propel itself into thepostseason. It’s one of the things that separate the contenders fromthe pretenders.
The San Diego State women’s volleyball team is currently on afour-match winning streak, heading into this weekend’s final matchesof the season. SDSU will be taking on Utah Friday night and BYUSaturday night at Peterson Gym. Both matches are slated for 7 p.m.starts. Saturday night’s match will be Senior Night.
The Aztecs have clinched at least the fourth seed in the MWCTournament, but winning these last two games could earn them thethird seed.
“Our overall goal is to win the tournament,” senior setter SaraEngstrom said. “We want a good seed to be in the position to win.”
Said senior Melissa Cansdale: “These matches are huge for us. Wehave at least the fourth seed, but we know we can do better. We knowwe can win these matches and get a better seed.”
If SDSU (17-11, 7-5) wants the better seed, it will have to gothrough second place Utah (16-7, 10-2) and third place BYU (18-7,8-4). The Aztecs lost to both teams when they played in Utah.
“We had BYU down 2-0 and we just underestimated them,” Cansdalesaid. We’re expecting the team that came out for the third game. Wewill be playing at that level whether they are or not.”
Before the Aztecs can get their revenge against BYU, they willhave to go through the Utes first.
Utah is led by Kim Turner who is second in the conference inkills, averaging four per game, and in blocks with an average of 1.5per game. Turner is also averaging 2.3 digs per game and she has ahitting percentage of .336.
Utah’s Jackie Morrill is second in the conference in digs,averaging 3.4 per game.
“We always play bad in Utah, but they’re in our house now,”Cansdale said. “We’re going to show them what it feels like.
SDSU has some weapons of its own to take on the Utes. Senior MeganSchauermann leads the league in blocks, averaging 1.6 per game.Engstrom is averaging 11 assists per game. Senior Aspen McPartlandand junior Kara Moriarty are both averaging three or more kills andtwo or more digs per game.
“The main thing is playing the best we can and just playing goodvolleyball,” Engstrom said. “All we need to worry about is keepingthe mistakes to a minimum and what we do on our side of the court.”
On Saturday night, the Aztecs will have to deal with the Cougars’Kim Wilson and Uila Crabbe. Wilson leads her team with 3.83 kills pergame, while Crabbe is averaging 3.54 digs per game.
“I really want to beat BYU the most,” Engstrom said. “We shouldhave beat them the first time. We have the advantage because it’s athome and it’s Senior Night.”
SDSU would love nothing more than extending its winning streak tosix matches heading into the conference tournament.
“We’re all more focused out there,” Cansdale said. “We focus moreon just winning each play at a time. We need to win, we want to win,we’re going to win.”
