Volleyball Preview: Woodland Regional Hawks vs. Naugatuck Greyhounds
The Woodland Regional Hawks are taking a road trip to challenge the Naugatuck Greyhounds at 6:00 p.m. on Friday.
Woodland Regional is coming in fresh off a high-stakes matchup with another one of Connecticut's top teams: Seymour, who was ranked 14th in their home state at the time (Woodland Regional was ranked 17th). Woodland Regional fell 3-1 to Seymour on Thursday. The Hawks' defeat signaled the end of their three-game winning streak.
Woodland Regional actually scored more points across those four sets (88-85), but sadly they still had to settle for second. Once all was said and done, the final score wound up at 25-22, 25-21, 10-25, 25-20.
Even though the team lost, they still had their share of impressive performances. One of the best came from Emily Ambrocio, who had ten digs and three aces. She is on a roll when it comes to aces, as she's now served three or more in the last three games she's played dating back to last season. The team also got some help courtesy of Sophia Ligi, who had five digs and five aces.
She wasn't the only good server: Woodland Regional was lethal from the service line and finished the game with 13 aces. That strong performance was nothing new for the team: they've now served at least 13 aces in four consecutive matches.
Meanwhile, Naugatuck had already won two in a row and they went ahead and made it three on Thursday. Everything went their way against the Falcons as they made off with a 3-0 victory.
Naugatuck was especially dominant in the first set. The match finished with set scores of 25-14, 26-24, 25-22.
Woodland Regional's loss ended a nine-game streak of away wins dating back to last season and brought them to 18-3-1. As for Naugatuck, their win bumped their record up to 15-3.
Here's a few offensive stats to keep an eye on ahead of Friday's game: Woodland Regional has really dialed in their serving this season, having averaged 14 aces per game. However, it's not like Naugatuck struggles in that department as they've been averaging 8.2. Given these competing strengths, it'll be interesting to see how their clash plays out.
Woodland Regional took their victory against Naugatuck in their previous matchup two weeks ago by a conclusive 3-0. The rematch might be a little tougher for Woodland Regional since the squad won't have the home-court advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
