Gabriella Matautia Gets Career-High 30 Kills to Lead Volleyball in a Five-Set Win at Fordham

Friday, October 19

Bronx, N.Y.

7:00 PM

Temple University

15-7, 5-3A10

Fordham

12-15, 4-4A10

Temple

Fordham

Gabriella Matautia led Temple with a career-high 30 kills

Photo by: Mitchell Leff

Gabriella Matautia Gets Career-High 30 Kills to Lead Volleyball in a Five-Set Win at Fordham

10.19.12 | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

BRONX, N.Y. - Gabriella Matautia knocked down a career-high 30 kills to lead Temple volleyball to a thrilling, 3-2 win at Fordham (12-15, 4-4) on Friday night in Atlantic 10 action. After rallying back to take an exciting, 26-24 win in the fourth set, Temple (15-7, 5-3) kept the momentum and won 15-11 in the final set.

In addition to her career-high 30 kills, Matautia served up five aces, recorded nine digs and four blocks. Elyse Burkert recorded a double-double with 13 kills and 20 digs, as did Tiffany Connatser with 53 assists and 11 digs. Chelsea Tupuola talled 16 digs, Jingyu Zhang added 14 digs to seven kills, and Jennifer Iacobini led the team in blocks with five.

The Owls won the first set 25-17, lost the second 25-22 and the third 25-19. They rebounded for a 26-24 win in the fourth set before taking the final set 15-11.

"Tonight was a really important win for us," said Temple head coach Bakeer Ganes. "We knew coming in how tough a match it would be because Fordham matches up so well against us, and they're a very big and physical team. We also had the same record as them so we knew they'd be motivated and would come after us.

"I'm just very happy for our girls. They worked really hard over the last few weeks and even though we had a couple of losses, we still got better as a team and the girls didn't get disappointed or discouraged. We had confidence that the work would pay off and today it did. What makes it even better is that Fordham came out and played so well also. This is a big win for us and also a big loss for Fordham, which puts us ahead in the standings. Hopefully coming out of the weekend, that will still be the case."

Matautia knocked down seven kills in the Owls' 25-17 first-set win, while Iacobini recorded three kills, two aces and two blocks. The set was close early, but after a final tie at 11-11, the Owls began pulling away. As a team, they tallied 13 kills and just three errors, hitting .370 while the Rams struggled with seven errors to eight kills.

The second set was tied at 11-11 before a 4-0 Fordham run. Later the Owls were down 19-15 but battled back and were within one at 22-21. They fought off one set point before a Fordham kill gave the Rams a 25-22 win to even the match at 1-1.

Temple was unable to shake off a slow start in the third set, and trailed by a few points most of the way in a 25-19 loss.

The fourth set really displayed the Owls' ability to make a comeback, as they trailed 21-17 before tying the set at 21-21. After another tie at 23-all, Zhang fought off a set and match point with a kill. After a kill from Burkert, an error on Fordham was all Temple needed to stay alive and win 26-24, forcing a fifth set.

The Owls kept the momentum, going up 4-1 and 9-3 in the fifth set. They would finish with 11 kills to Fordham's six, the 11th coming from Zhang for the set and match-winner.

Temple will play another match on the road this Sunday, facing Rhode Island at 1:00 p.m.