No. 17 Baylor Volleyball Grinds Out Tough Win over Oklahoma, 3-2
WACO, Texas — No. 17 Baylor Volleyball (13-3, 3-1) fought hard to earn a five-set victory over the Oklahoma Sooners (11-5, 1-3) Wednesday night at the Ferrell Center. The sets went as follows: 22-25, 25-18, 25-23, 20-25, 15-10.
Lauren Harrison registered a double-double with 15 kills and 10 digs while Allie Sczech had an incredibly efficient night with 13 kills, just one error and a hitting percentage of .632. Faith Lynch also stepped up in big off the bench to ice the third set, an example of just how much of a team effort this win was.
Early on it felt like Ryan McGuyre was willing his team through the fight. He successfully challenged the very first point, lost a second challenge in the set, and used both timeouts. his bears made a nice little 3-0 run toward the end of the set to get it to 22-20, but they eventually fell 25-22.
The Bears got things going halfway through the second set when they opened up a 17-11 lead. The Sooners took a timeout at that point, and again at 21-14, but to no avail. Kara McGhee helped finish the set with a pair of kills and the Bears tied things up 1-1 with a 25-18 set two victory.
The third set was where Bears got gritty and really earned a big part of their win. With the Sooners leading 11-9, it looked like Baylor was getting a little sloppy. Instead of letting the set get away from them, they fought through and earned a 21-19 lead.
From there OU responded, grabbing a 23-22 edge before the green and gold tied it up.
McGuyre then sent sophomore Faith Lynch in to ice the set on her serve. She did just that including an ace to seal the deal. 25-23.
“Very proud of Faith to come in with the big ace at the end of the third set,” said coach McGuyre, “That was a huge, huge momentum shift.”
In the fourth set, Baylor pushed hard early to deliver a knockout blow, but the Bears’ 6-3 lead was demolished by a 6-1 Sooners run. After gaining the lead, Oklahoma pushed it to 16-11 before the green and gold narrowed it back to one at 18-17.
The visitors stayed composed though, rallied, and saw out the set 25-20.
So came the decisive final set. With it tied at 5-5, Kara McGhee created some separation with a kill and a block with Sczech before Averi Carlson made it a 3-0 run with an ace. Even the media timeout could not help the Sooners recover because that is when Allie Sczech took over.
Sczech earned points 11, 12 and 13 for the Bears with two kills and a block to cap her run. It was a great display of talent in crunch time from the freshman and her mentality on the court clearly helped her rise to the occasion.
“At the end of the day, every point is just a point. You have to go out with the mentality 'okay, it just point 11' and I think as long as everything that I'm doing in practice is transferring over and I’m just trusting that, when those big times come you just go for it. You don't really think, you just kind of do.”
Lauren Harrison then helped finish things off with one final kill to take the fifth set 15-10.
For the senior, getting back into the swing of things after missing the first two Big 12 games is huge both for herself and the team.
“I feel like I'm starting to get in rhythm and be more comfortable on the defensive end and just knowing where the ball's gonna go with Averi”
Coach McGuyre had a few other notes on the Bears’ play, emphasizing that there is a lot of work still to be done to get where this young team wants to go.
He noted specifically that the block did not show up early in the match for the Bears and that their service game was too hit or miss.
“It was very frustrating, just because I know we’re better [than that],” coach said of the service errors.
It should be noted though, for young teams, hard-fought close wins are some of the best outcomes. They put pressure on relatively inexperienced players and return teaching tape along with experience all without hurting the record at the end of the day.
This team has a lot of talent, so they will need to gain that experience to get where they want to go, to win championships.
Up Next: at West Virginia, Saturday 10/8 Noon CT on ESPN+
