The LSU volleyball team is calling its straight-set win against South Carolina a fresh start to a new season.
After a 2-5 start in Southeastern Conference play that included a five-set home loss to Georgia less than a week ago, LSU coach Fran Flory, along with the rest of her team, are forgetting about the beginning of the season and start new.
“We kind of decided that this would be the restart of the season,” Flory said. “…We acted like this was the first match of our season, and we’re going to continue and see what we can accomplish.”
LSU would take the first game of its “new season” in straight sets 29-27, 25-23 and 25-12.
The Tigers had their best offensive game of the season against the Gamecock defense, posting a .359 hitting clip — more than 16 percent higher than their season average — while only committing 11 hitting errors, 10 fewer than their season average.
The trio of junior Desiree Elliott, sophomore Helen Boyle and senior Madie Jones has been the driving force behind the LSU offense all season after being responsible for 77 percent of the Tigers’ kills thus far.
The three’s performance against South Carolina was no different, leading the offensive push with 44 kills on a .375 hitting clip.
“Jones carries a huge load for us all the time,” Flory said. “Certainly [Elliott] has to be our go-to middle — she’s so fast and dynamic, everyone knows she’s going to get the ball, and she’s still able to out quick teams. … The emergence of Helen has really been the salvation of our offense this year.”
It didn’t take long for the two teams to get acquainted with each other during a hard-fought first set that resulted in 12 lead changes and took an extra seven points to finally come to a conclusion.
But it was in the second set where the Tigers began to take control of the match and dive headfirst into their newfound fresh-start mentality.
LSU fell behind early in the second set when South Carolina jumped to a 14-7 lead, but Elliott, Jones and Boyle would combine for eight kills to catapult LSU to a 14-4 run.
“We had talked about heading into the locker room with momentum,” said senior libero Meghan Mannari. “In our heads we realized that we needed to change something and being down and coming back was a big deal. It helped us going into the locker room and into the third set, taking care of business on our side.”
It also appears that Mannari has returned full-time to her libero position after suffering an ankle injury a month ago. Mannari played every set at libero since switching with her replacement, senior defensive specialist Sam Delahoussaye, following the third set against Georgia, but Flory continues to say the decision of who will play in the different color jersey will be made on a game-to-game basis.
The Tigers will now turn their attention to Wednesday’s match against preseason SEC favorite Tennessee.
“Every match with Tennessee has just been a war,” Flory said. “Our players enjoy that match, and I think their players enjoy that match. … Tennessee is very physical, and they’re as quick and dynamic and as athletic as any other team in the league.”
