Opponent:
Salem at Meredith | USA South Conference Tournament | Weatherspoon Athletic Center | Raleigh, N.C. | Thursday, November 9 | 7 p.m.
SPIRITS MARCH TO SEMIFINAL ROUND WITH WIN OVER WILLIAM PEACE
For the second time in as many seasons the Salem volleyball team will head to the USA South Conference Tournament Semifinals. The Spirits secured their spot in the league tournament with a five-set victory at William Peace on Tuesday, November 7th.
Salem will make the trip back to the North Carolina capital, Raleigh, to square off with Meredith on Thursday evening at 7 p.m. The match marks the second time in program history that the two schools have met in the postseason. Salem hosted Meredith on November 1, 2022, and came away with a five-set victory over the Avenging Angels by scores of 25-17,19-25,27-25,20-25,15-4 to advance to in the 2022 USA South Conference Tournament.
MEETING MEREDITH FOR THIRD TIME THIS SEASON
For the second time in program history and the second time in as many seasons, Salem and Meredith will clash not only twice in the regular season, but once in the USA South Conference Tournament.
The Avenging Angels, who have a 17-3 edge in the all-time series, completed a regular season sweep of Salem with victories on September 14th and October 10th. However, with both teams earning victories on Tuesday in the USA South Conference Tournament, the two will square off for the second time in postseason play.
One year ago, on November 1, 2022, Salem earned its second victory ever in the USA South Conference Tournament in a five-set thriller (25-17, 19-25, 27-25, 20-25, 15-4) against Meredith. The Avenging Angels are 7-0 all-time when facing Salem in the Triangle.
RYMER, WOOD DELIVER CLUTCH FIFTH-SET PERFORMANCES IN WIN OVER PACERS
Junior Anna Rymer came through in the clutch, with a clutch performance for Salem volleyball as she singlehandedly scored five of the final seven points of the match, leading the cardiac Spirits to their sixth consecutive five-set win, which came over William Peace by scores of 23-25, 25-16, 17-25, 25-17, 15-12. With the victory, Salem will now face Meredith in the Semifinal Round of the USA South Conference Tournament on Thursday evening.
Sophomore Ashlyn Wood also had her hand in the final five points of the match, taking over in serve after a slam by Rymer made for a 12-10 William Peace lead. Wood delivered a service ace to put the Spirits within one, and handed out each of the next four assists, including three to Rymer and one to Ella Brameus, as the Spirits clinched their second Semifinal Round bid in as many seasons.
The back-and-forth battle of the fifth frame began as Salem rallied from a 5-3 deficit to even the set at five-all with a slam from Lopez. Bradley added a kill of her own, but a block and a kill from Audrey Spindle eventually allowed William Peace to assume an 11-7 lead. Jacie Jarvis and Rymer electrified the Spirits bench with slams of their own, resulting in the 12-9 William Peace advantage.
Rymer delivered her match-high 17 kills with efficiency, posting a .389 attack percentage along the way. She was joined in double figure kills by the trio of Aspen Bradley (12), Valeria Rosa Lopez (11) and Abrielle Eckenroth (10). That quartet, with Wood and Jolina Bun combining for 44 assists, helped Salem tally 59 kills in five sets.
Macy Nelson dove all over the court at the Hermann Athletic Center on Tuesday evening, coming through with 20 digs, while Lopez added 18. Eckenroth completed a double-double with 13 digs of her own as Salem tallied 80 as a unit.
SALEM TRIO RECEIVE USA SOUTH ALL-CONFERENCE ACCOLADES
After wrapping up the most successful regular season in program history, capped off by a program-record 22nd win and the fourth seed in the league tournament, three members of the Salem volleyball unit were named to the USA South All-Conference Team on Wednesday morning in a statement from the league office. The trio of Macy Nelson (All-Sportsmanship), Anna Rymer (Second Team All-Conference) and Valeria Rosa Lopez (Second Team All-Conference) were recognized as top performers in 2023 according to a vote from the league's head coaches.
Rymer and Lopez join teammate Aspen Bradley as the only three players in program history to earn Second Team All-Conference honors for the Spirits. Bradley accomplished the feat in 2022 as a first year for the Spirits. Meanwhile, Nelson joins Ashlen Rector, Alexis Sunderland, Corrin Shores, Anna Schneider, Nikita Sizemore and Ashlyn Wood as recipients of the All-Sportsmanship Award.
GRAB YOUR POPCORN, SODA … AND YOUR DEFIBRILLATOR
One thing for certain, it is blatantly obvious to anyone who encounters a Salem volleyball fan the day or evening after a match—the fan presents with symptoms of fatigue, red eyes and a racing heart.
After all, the Spirits have endured three five-set matches in their last six outings. Dating back to a clash with Bob Jones on October 28th, the Spirits and their fans have endured three five-set affairs against the Bruins, Southern Virginia (Nov. 1) and William Peace (Nov. 7).
These matches have left the fans, athletic staff as well as coaches Barry Rymer, Corrin Shores and Kelley Coats in search of both enough popcorn and soda to get them through the match, along with defibrillator's for the heart-racing action that they are providing.
The five-set epidemic at Salem began with a three-set rally against Bob Jones at a tri-match in Misenheimer, N.C., on the Pfeiffer campus. Facing an 0-2 deficit to the Bruins, Salem used 17 kills from Anna Rymer along with 12 from Aspen Bradley to win three straight sets for the come-from-behind victory (13-25, 27-29, 25-23, 25-18, 17-15).
Four days later, in a clash with USA South Conference rival Southern Virginia, the Spirits again fell into an 0-2 deficit. Salem gradually chipped away at the Knights' lead, which included a 13-10 deficit late in the fifth set, to earn an 18-25, 16-25, 25-20, 33-31, 15-13 victory.
In an effort to keep the fans on the edge of their seats, Salem followed the trend with a five-set affair against William Peace in the USA South Conference Tournament. Trailing 2-1 in the match, the Spirits posted a fourth set victory to send the match to a decisive fifth set. In that frame, facing a late 12-9 deficit, the Spirits again rallied to earn a spot in the Semifinals of the league tournament against Meredith.
Salem is 5-0 in five-set matches in 2023 and has a six-match winning streak, which dates back to a win over Meredith in the first round of the 2022 USA South Conference Tournament.
LOPEZ BREAKS SINGLE-SEASON KILLS MARK
Salem senior outside hitter reached yet another kill milestone this season in Tuesday evening's clash against William Peace—becoming the single-season kill leader.
Lopez capped off the regular season finale by reaching the 1,000-kill mark in her collegiate career, which coincidentally placed her with Taylor Moulton and Kylie Taffer as the only three members of the 1,000-kill club along with becoming the second Spirit to notch at least 1,000 digs and 1,000 kills in a career, joining Moulton as the only two players to accomplish that feat.
In Tuesday's match against William Peace, Lopez tallied 11 kills, and in doing so she topped teammate Aspen Bradley's single-season mark for kills. Bradley became the single-season leader with 351 in 2022, topping the mark formerly held by Kylie Taffer in 2016, who tallied 2016.
However, Lopez used 21 double-digit kill performances in 2023 to eclipse the mark established by Bradley. Her best individual performance of the season (27 kills) was also a program mark. Lopez toppled the program's all-time single-match kill record versus Methodist on September 26th, which had stood for 4,728 days, with a 27-kill, 15-dig outing that resulted in a .353 attack percentage as the Spirits claimed a thrilling five-set victory over the Monarchs (25-13, 17-25, 25-22, 20-18).
BRAMEUS, WOOD COLLECTING MAJOR POINTS IN SERVE
One phase of the current six-match winning streak for the Spirits that extends beyond the boxscore is the importance of the service game. That component has been led by sophomores Ella Brameus and Ashlyn Wood.
In the last six matches, Brameus has delivered 14 service aces for Salem, while Wood has come through with five of her own.
Brameus, who suffered a lower leg injury early in the season, delivered one service ace against both Southern Virginia and Roanoke. She followed that up by recording the second-most service aces in a single match in program history (11) in a three-set sweep of Mary Baldwin. At one point of the first set, Brameus had accounted for six service aces in a 10-point span against the Fighting Squirrels.
Meanwhile, in the case of Wood, her service aces have come in pressure cooker situations. Facing a 13-10 deficit in the waning stages of the clash with Southern Virginia, Wood stepped into serve and came through with four unanswered points to put the Spirits at match point, leading 14-13. It was there that the Kings Mountain, N.C., native delivered a service ace, catching Jessica Ensley off guard, to give Salem the victory.
Familiar with the moment, Wood repeated that scenario in Tuesday's clash with William Peace. Facing a 12-10 deficit, following a kill from Anna Rymer, Wood was again in serve with the match on the line. The sophomore setter delivered a service ace for the first point in serve and assisted Rymer and Brameus on the next four points to send Salem to victory.
