LEXINGTON – The Washington and Lee volleyball team took down Old Dominion Athletic Conference member Randolph College in straight sets, 3-0 (25-14, 25-14, 25-19), on Friday evening.
Tonight's victory for the Generals (6-6, 3-0 ODAC) marks the 42nd win and 13th straight set over the WildCats (8-5, 0-2). The Blue and White have not dropped a set to RAND since the 2018 matchup went into five.
To earn that 10th set, W&L opened the night on a 8-3 run to force the WildCats to take a timeout. After the break, the Generals used the momentum to a 17-10 advantage and earned the set off senior Ashley Webb (Thousand Oaks, Calif. / Westlake) who posted two serving aces, sandwiched by two RAND errors to take the set 25-14.
The Blue and White and the visitors traded rallies to open the second period but a 5-0 run gave the Generals a 10-6 lead, one that they would not relinquish. Another 5-point spurt brought W&L to a 23-12 score. The set ended the way it started with with traded points until Webb set up sophomore Avery Myers (New York, N.Y. / Poly Prep Country Day) with a set-point kill.
Coming into tonight's match Webb was sitting nine assists back from moving into third in the Blue and White's all-time career record books. She notched 25 in the contest to climb up the ladder with 2,409 career assists.
With the Generals on top 2-0, the WildCats found a spark of confidence and took its first lead of the match and persisted to a 16-14 advantage. Eight straight tallies for the hometown heroes proved to be the turning point to take back the lead 22-16. Two straight kills from first-year Caroline Natwick ( Charlotte, N.C. / Charlotte Christian) and Sydney Heifner (Nashville, Tenn. / Harpeth Hall) sent W&L to a match point. The Blue and White won on a Randolph attack error.
WLU recorded six service aces and seven blocks in the matchup.
Heifner posted 15 kills in the match, marking an impressive 11 of 12 matches with the double-digit stat line during the 2022 season.
The Generals return to Holekamp Gym on Saturday to take on the University of Lynchburg at 11 a.m. in ODAC competition.
