Volleyball Loses in Straight Sets to No. 10 Georgia Tech

By: Ryan Bridges | @RyanBridges517

CitrusTV Volleyball Beat Reporter

Atlanta, G.A. – Volleyball had a tough matchup on Sunday. Their opponent, Georgia Tech, was ranked 10th in the country. On the top of that, the Yellow Jackets only home losses this season were to #8 Ohio State and #9 Pittsburgh. So when the Orange lost in straight sets to Georgia Tech on Sunday, it wasn’t much of a surprise.

Despite falling behind in each set by at least six points, SU kept finding a way to make each set competitive.

In the first, Syracuse fell behind 12-4 at the start. However, the Orange went on a 10-1 run to cut the Yellow Jackets lead to just one point. With the score at 16-15, SU had a chance to take their first lead of the day and turn the tide of a match they were not favored to win. Unfortunately for Syracuse, they lost the next four points, giving Georgia Tech a 20-15 lead. The Yellow Jackets went on to win the first set, 25-18.

The Orange responded well to the first set loss. They even led 10-9 in the second set after a powerful kill by Polina Shemanova.

Georgia Tech then scored nine points in a row, and the worst part about it was that five of those nine points came off of attacking errors by SU. The Orange hit the ball into the net multiple times, and could not establish any sort of rhythm.

The Yellow Jackets would use the 9-0 run to cruise to a 25-21 set win.

Down 2-0 with O’Keefe Gymnasium rocking, there was no way out for Syracuse.

SU fell behind early and struggled to get back into the game. The Orange would go on to lose their third straight set by a margin of five.

Georgia Tech dominated Syracuse on the box score as well, registering a whopping 48 kills in just three sets. For comparison, SU only had 28.

The ‘Cuse will play Miami and Florida State at home next week.