Aggies down vt in final match, sweep hokie invite

Josh Coover

Staff Writer

September 19, 2021

Blacksburg – NC A&T defeated Virginia Tech 3-2 on Saturday afternoon in Cassell, winning its third match in a row. Entering Saturday, Tech was 4-0 when a match went five sets.

Both teams went back and forth during each set, making for an exciting finish.

“I thought A&T did a good job, they were in system a lot,” head coach Marci Byers said. “I didn’t think our serve was very good tonight, they were able to be in system. We had to kind of struggle out of system to be able to swing, to be able to do that.”

North Carolina A&T (8-4 overall, 0-0 Big South) combined for 66 kills through the course of five sets. Edie Brewer led the team with 14 kills while Fatimah Shabazz and Naiya Sawtelle both had 13.

The Aggies dropped the first two sets against the Hokies (28-26, 25-22) and it appeared that VT was going to sweep the match in three sets. After the second set ended, NC A&T never trailed Tech in the final three sets.

Virginia Tech (9-3 overall, 0-0 ACC) played from behind in the first two sets, taking control of each set towards the end and pulling away from the Aggies late. As Head Coach Byers mentioned, ‘serves was what hurt the Hokies,’ but she assured her team over the next week that its focus point is to work on serving the volleyball.

“In the next four days we’re going to definitely have to work on our serve and being more confident in our serve and putting it in certain spots and working on our serves received,” Byers said. “Volleyball is a serve, pass game so if you cannot do that, you lose.”

Looking ahead to Tech's next matchup, Clemson comes into Friday’s game (8-3 overall, 0-0 ACC) and has won two in a row, both of those matches were at home. The Tigers have struggled on the road so far this season, only winning one out of the five away games they have played.

ACC conference play opens for both Clemson and Virginia Tech Friday at 6 p.m. in Cassell Coliseum on the ACC Network Extra.