Duke did not have to travel far this Halloween to find a particularly scary matchup.
Instead, the Blue Devils stayed home Friday to welcome No. 4 Pittsburgh to Durham. The Blue Devils ultimately fell to their ACC foe in a 3-0 sweep inside Cameron Indoor Stadium in a matchup that felt bitterly out of reach for the home team.
Duke began its match against the Panthers hot, pushing the powerhouse against the ropes and evening the score of the first set at 10 points apiece after a series of back-and-forth exchanges. The Blue Devils’ chance to clinch the first set was shut down quickly, though, as Pittsburgh unleashed a 15-9 point run led by redshirt senior Brooke Mosher, who tallied two service aces while setting up a blistering Panthers attack. Duke was not passive in the face of the mounting pressure, however.
“Today, we were aggressive for sure,” head coach Jolene Nagel said, “but we had a lot of errors.”
Aggressive and error-prone perfectly encapsulates the Blue Devils’ performance Friday. Despite recording almost 30 fewer points than Pittsburgh, Duke (5-17, 2-9 in the ACC) managed to tally 97 attacks — five more attacks than its opponent — falling just shy of reaching the century mark in that regard. The pitfalls of this strategy, which allowed the Blue Devils to remain competitive against No. 8 Louisville earlier in the season, were clear to see, with Nagel’s team posting 20 errors on the day.
Duke’s miscues continued, especially in regards to serving. Offensively, the Blue Devils committed nine service errors throughout the course of the game; however, it was the Panther’s prowess in this arena that defined the match. Pittsburgh scored seven putaways on serves against Duke on its way to notching a dominant 0.326 hitting clip. While the Blue Devils did struggle to contain the visitor’s attack, the improvement of the team was clear to see.
“I thought when we got good block touches, we slowed the ball down well, and our defense worked hard to get involved,” Nagel said.
It didn’t show up on the stat sheet, but Duke rallied to the ball well, and although they often did not produce points, the Blue Devils were excellent at slowing the game down. Whether off a dig or a finger-tip block from a defender, Duke played the game at its own pace, launching high-arching sets to the benefit of their hitters. The Blue Devil defense, however, took a serious hit when Mailinh Godschall sat on the bench talking to trainers in between the first and second sets.
With Duke’s defensive anchor sidelined, freshman libero Aly Donoghue was called in. The Toronto native played in her sixth career set, earning her first assist in her collegiate resume. Although Donoghue would be subbed out for Godschall as the score reached 5-2 in favor of Pittsburgh, her teammates’ reactions spoke volumes of the team culture Nagel has fostered. Every touch of the ball from the defensive backup was greeted with deafening cheer from not only the players on the court, but those watching from the sidelines as well.
“Aly’s always hustling, always working,” Nagel said. “So I think that the team is just excited for her to get that opportunity out there.”
While the team ultimately fell short of the outcome it was searching for, the impactful contributions of the young Blue Devils on the roster continue to give hope to a team looking to grow into expectations. Sophomore Taylor Williams paced the team with a total of 10 kills on the day, earning herself double-digits in the stat for the 13th time this season. Young players led the team elsewhere, too, with freshman setter Charlotte Glass posting 21 assists and sophomore Avery Hamlin blocking a team-high three attacks on the match.
“We’ll continue to work on swinging high, because these teams coming in are going to be just as big,” Nagel said. “And we’ll work on that, and our coverage too, to be able to recycle a ball rather than get blocked at the net.”
As Duke sets its eyes on an upcoming matchup against yet another ranked ACC competitor, it does not plan to abandon its aggressive attack even in the face of a literal looming defense. Circumventing the challenge of four different 6-foot-4 players was difficult for the Blue Devils Friday, and learning how to navigate opponents’ height advantages will continue to be a learning curve for Nagel’s young team.
Duke stays home Sunday to battle No. 7 SMU before heading to the West Coast for two matchups later this week.