Cal State Fullerton women\u2019s volleyball snapped a four game skid with a straight-set victory over Cal State Bakersfield on Saturday afternoon, winning 25-21, 25-22, 25-20.<\/p>\n
The Titans led in just about every notable statistic. CSUF had more kills, attempts, points, assists, blocks and aces. They also recorded a better hitting percentage than the Roadrunners, while committing less errors.<\/p>\n
Though still early in the season, the Titans have struggled with efficiency \u2013 they currently place seventh in the Big West with a hitting percentage of .179 while committing 343 errors. With 11 underclassmen on the roster, head coach Nicky Cannon preached the need to play with conviction and commitment to the process.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore the game, we were talking about the difference between confidence and conviction,\u201d Cannon said. \u201cYes, we can come out with confidence, but when it gets hard, it’s hard to still have it. The difference is \u2013 conviction, you don\u2019t need permission to have confidence, you believe even when you\u2019re down.\u201d<\/p>\n
After a lackluster performance on Thursday, freshman Lira Pukl Verdel led the Titans offensively with nine kills while also contributing two aces.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was focused. [I was] getting my feet to the ball faster, attacking a little bit smarter,\u201d Pukl Verdel said. \u201cAlso, [my] connections with the setter were a lot better today.\u201d<\/p>\n
Senior Ketesia Hall anchored both the Titans\u2019 attack and defense, finishing with eight kills and five blocks. Hall now has 46 total blocks this season.<\/p>\n
Freshman Devin Hicks carved out a role as the Titans\u2019 ace specialist, delivering five service aces in the match. Hicks also finished with a season-high 15 assists and seven digs.<\/p>\n
Freshmen Marisa Nakata, Mia Feldhaus, Zariah Crosby, Feao Saluni and Hannah Hass also contributed in all three sets.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Cannon was encouraged with the chemistry of the team going forward.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I recruited this group, one of the biggest things was \u2018do you want to be a part of building something?\u2019 Cannon said. \u201cIt requires more to build than it does to come into an already-established program. I was like, \u2018Are you up for the challenge?\u2019 \u2013 and anybody that was like, \u2018Hell yeah coach, let\u2019s go,\u2019 \u2013\u00a0 I already knew that they had that dog and that relentlessness in them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now 7-11 overall and 2-4 in conference, the Titans will travel to UC Santa Barbara for a weekend matchup on Friday night before traveling to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo on Saturday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Friday\u2019s contest against the Gauchos is set for 7 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cal State Fullerton women\u2019s volleyball snapped a four game skid with a straight-set victory over Cal State Bakersfield…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1597,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[151,153,152,2356,2360,2361,2355,2354,2357,2358,2353,2359],"class_list":["post-1596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bakersfield","tag-bakersfield","tag-bakersfield-headlines","tag-bakersfield-news","tag-devin-hicks","tag-feao-saluni","tag-hannah-hass","tag-ketesia-hall","tag-lira-pukl-verdel","tag-marisa-nakata","tag-mia-feldhaus","tag-nicky-cannon","tag-zariah-crosby"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}