Coker Improves to 4-1, St. Ambrose Upends Quincy; Jan. 22/23 Recap

With not much action occurring over the past few days, we consolidated the action into one post detailing the one-match day from Monday and Tuesday.

On the first day of the week, St. Ambrose from NAIA classification pulled off a comeback upset over Quincy while on day two Coker notched a victory to improve its record to 4-1 on the season.

January 22:

St. Ambrose Def. Quincy 3-2 (22-25, 21-25, 25-21, 25-20, 15-8)

St. Ambrose 2-2; Quincy 2-2
Box Score
Quincy Press Release

St. Ambrose pulled off the reverse sweep after falling behind 2-0 in sets against Quincy. Scott MacGillis (21 kills, .395, 7 digs, 4 aces) was fantastic in every outlet for St. Ambrose as he helped the team overcome Shane McAdams‘ (17 kills, .414, 4 digs) offensive brilliance. The serving battle might have been the biggest difference, as St. Ambrose logged six more aces with as many errors. Beyond the numbers, the serve helped keep Quincy in check and out of sorts in the third and fifth sets during the comeback. That should give Quincy something to work on into the DI-DII season, while St. Ambrose is receiving votes in the latest NAIA poll.

January 23:

Coker Def. St. Andrews 3-1 (21-25, 25-14, 25-18, 25-17)

Coker continued its strong start to the 2018 season and overcame an early set deficit to improve to 4-1. It wasn’t the best display of offense for them, but the defense and serve was strong in holding St. Andrews to a .062 mark for the match. Part of that was from defense led by Joao Victor Santos (6 blocks) and Aleksa Bijelic (10 digs to go with 28 assists), while their 10 aces signified their ability to keep St. Andrews out of system and on their heels. That was enough to thwart the attempts of Robin Imar (15 kills, 11 digs), as St. Andrews had 25 kills versus 28 attack errors in the final three sets.