Davis Has 19 Kills as Aztecs Volleyball Outlasts Yavapai College in Five Sets
The Pima Community College volleyball team (15-13, 5-8 in ACCAC) snapped a four-game skid in a back-and-forth matchup on Friday against Yavapai College.
The Aztecs hung on to win a five-set thriller over Yavapai 25-20, 6-25, 25-25-16, 16-25, 17-15. Down 15-14 in the tie-breaking set, sophomore Jamie Holliday (Sahuaro HS) put down a kill which was followed by an ace by fellow sophomore Angel Chavez (Mingus Union HS) to put Pima ahead. Freshman Kristin Baldwin (Thatcher HS) had the set-winning block to seal it.
The Aztecs won the first set after they widened a 19-18 lead with five straight set points. Sophomore Arisa Chavez put down the kill that won it. After struggling and dropping the second set, the Aztecs responded. Up 14-12, they secured nine of the next 10 points to take a 23-13 lead. Holliday had two kills and an ace during that stretch. The Aztecs trailed the entire fourth set as Yavapai tied the match at 2-2.
Pima took a 4-0 lead in the fifth set tie-breaker but Yavapai came back and put the Aztecs behind 8-7. Later in the set, freshman Victoria Davis (Sahuaro HS) had a kill and Baldwin had an ace to put the Aztecs back up 11-9 forcing Yavapai to call a timeout. There were three more ties and two more lead changes leading up to the dramatic finish.
The Aztecs handed Yavapai just their second defeat in ACCAC conference play (16-6, 9-2).
Davis finished the match with 19 kills and 15 digs while Baldwin had 11 kills, five digs and three blocks. Holliday had 10 kills and nine digs and Arisa Chavez had eight kills and 13 digs. Sophomore Miranda Bingham (Safford HS) finished with 53 assists and 14 digs and Angel Chavez (Mingus Union HS) had 30 digs.
"I congratulated the team on a consistent effort and that's what we had struggled with,' Pima coach Dan Bithell said. "Getting any win is good but this could have bigger implications and it hopefully gives us a little momentum heading into the end of the season."
"Our mind set was okay after the second set, we didn't respond to their level of execution but we had great composure in the 3rd set to respond. It was similar heading into the tiebreaker. We made tactical errors in fourth set and we corrected those a bit. Even being down one at the switch, we realized we had been in that position before. We had a lot more determination and we stuck with each other."
The Aztecs will be back at the West Campus on Wednesday when they host Mesa Community College at 7:00 p.m.
Victoria Davis/Photo by Michael Cox 2015
