After a hot start at the Jaguar Invitational, the 2-0 Texas A&M volleyball team returned home to host the 0-2 Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islanders on Monday at Reed Arena. The Aggies swept the Islanders 3-0.
The Islanders came to College Station ready to play, starting Set 1 by jumping out to an early 6-4 lead before going on a 3-0 run, going up 9-4.
Kills from junior transfer middle blocker Morgan Perkins and junior outside hitter Emily Hellmuth put the Aggies within three before the two teams continued to trade points. With a 15-13 lead, the Islanders went on a 3-0 run, courtesy of three attack errors and a kill by Islander senior outside hitter Kyndal Payne, forcing coach Jamie Morrison to call a timeout.
During the break, the Aggies composed themselves, going on an 8-2 run to take the lead, 21-20. The Aggies and Islanders went on to trade points until kills from Perkins and Hellmuth put the opening set away in favor of the Aggies, 26-24.
In Set 2, the teams traded early runs with the Islanders going 4-0 after falling behind, 2-1. The Aggies responded with a 12-2 run of their own, led by Perkins’ back-to-back kills. The Aggies’ four aces, as well as Perkins’ flurries of kills, played a major role in their 25-11 win in Set 2.
The start of Set 3 was all Aggies, with A&M jumping out to a 15-6 lead courtesy of back-to-back kills from both Perkins and junior MB Ifenna Cos-Okpalla. All four kills were set up by junior transfer setter Maddie Waak, who ended the night with 37 assists, leading the match.
After falling behind early, the Islanders were able to cut the lead to two, largely thanks to a 5-0 run led by Payne’s two kills and an ace from MB Leah Stolfus.
The Aggies responded with three points of their own before trading back and forth with the Islanders. A block by Cos-Okpalla put the match away in favor of the Aggies, 25-22. She finished the game with five blocks and nine kills. Perkins and Lednicky led with 12 kills each, moving their season totals to 25 and 46, respectively.
“I’m really fired up about where this group is going as a whole,” Morrison said. “We have so many weapons and it is going to be different peoples’ nights on different nights.”
The match had nearly 2,500 fans in attendance, drawing quite the audience for the Labor Day holiday.
“Our crowd is amazing. They support us so well,” Perkins said. “Coming from my old program [Oklahoma], I’ve never had this many people watching before, so that’s great.”
The Aggies open SEC play on Sept. 27 and will hope to continue building momentum until then.
”I think if we figure those kinks out in the preseason, we’ve got the SEC down,” Lednicky said. “The teams are only going to get better.”
The Aggies will stay home with their next opponent being the Texas State Bobcats on Friday, Sept. 6 at 6:30 p.m. on SEC Network+.
