Volleyball Closes Out Regular Season Road Schedule in Florida

PHILADELPHIA - The Temple volleyball team will conclude its regular season road schedule this weekend as they travel to Florida for a pair of matches against UCF on Friday, Nov. 19 in Orlando at 7 p.m. ET and Sunday, Nov. 21 in Tampa against the USF Bulls at 1 p.m. ET.

Both matches will be available on the ESPN+ app.

OWL ABOUT TEMPLE

The Owls will close out the regular-season road schedule starting on on Friday, Nov. 19 versus UCF and then round out the weekend with a match at USF on Sunday afternoon.
Temple heads into the weekend with a 5-22 overall record and 1-15 AAC play.
Miray Bolukbasi ranks seventh in the AAC as she leads the Owls' offense on the right side with 3.26 kills per set.
Fellow hitters, Gem Grimshaw and Katerina Papazoglou round out the outside hitters as they add in 3.23 k/s and 1.27 k/s, respectively.
Both Grimshaw are Papazoglou are vital in the serve reception game as Grimshaw is second on the team with 2.38 digs/set, while Papazoglou has added 2.18. On Nov. 12, versus Wichita State, Papazoglou marked her name in the Temple record book with her 1000th career dig.
Taylor Davenport averages 1.41 kills per set at the middle blocker position, with a team-leading 1.14 blocks per set, good for fourth in the conference.
Freshman Patrycja Zielinska quarterbacks the offense to the tune of 8.05 assists per frame.
Libero Falanika Danielson is fifth in the American with 4.07 digs per set.

SCOUTING UCF

The UCF Knights have a two-match advantage lead in the conference over Houston for first place.
On Wednesday night, UCF improved to 23-6 overall and 16-1 in conference play as it capped off its 12th straight victory in conference play by sweeping the the USF Bulls by the score of 25-16, 25-15, 25-15.
The Knights were led by McKenna Melville's Melville's 21 kills with zero errors while hitting .600. She also added four blocks and an ace. As a team, the Knights tallied 9.5 team blocks and were led by Nerissa Moravec's five.
On the season, UCF ranks at the top of five team categories in the conference, including hitting percentage (.278), assists (1305) assists per set (12.79), kills (1394), kills per set (13.67), blocks (269), blocks per set (2.64), and service aces per set (1.87).
Melville is not only one of the AAC's best but also the nation's best hitters.The UCF outside hitter is ranked first in the nation with the total number of kills of 525 and total points at 495.

TEMPLE VS. UCF

They began the series in 2013, and both teams won three straight matches.
However, the series has been dominated by UCF over the last nine matches, including making nine consecutive defeats over the Owls earlier this season (Oct. 17).
Overall, the Knights have won 13 of the last 18 contests versus Temple.
On Oct. 15, Miray Bolukbasi led the Owls with 10 kills, but UCF controlled the match throughout. UCF's UCF's McKenna Melville led all players with a match-high 18 kills, and setter Nerissa Moravec led the game with 26 assists. The last time Temple won a match over the Knights occurred on Oct. 15, 2017, when Izzy Rapacz had a match-high 25 kills, and Kyra Coundourides poured in a match-high 48 assists for the Cherry and Red.

SCOUTING USF

The Bulls fell to 7-21 overall and 1-16 in the AAC as they got swept in straight sets to the UCF Knights on Wednesday night by the score of 15-25, 16-25, 16-25.
USF currently is in last place of the 12-team conference.
Marta Cvitkovic had a strong night for USF as she recorded team-highs that included 13 kills and four aces.
The freshman outside hitter was also amongst the leaders in the match with two blocks.
Before the loss to UCF, the Bulls knocked off Memphis in five sets for their lone AAC win of the season. The Bulls began the conference season with 15 straight losses. Cvitkovic is one of the Bulls' program's bright spots as she's third in the conference with .40 aces/set and is tied for the second-most aces in league with 103.

TEMPLE VS. USF

The two teams squared off earlier this season in Philadelphia, where the Owls picked up their lone conference victory in five sets to beat the Bulls.
In the match, Gem Grimshaw led the Cherry and White in a come-from-behind fashion with 18 kills. Temple capitalized on 18 team blocks to assist in the win. Individually, sophomore Taylor Davenport led the block party with nine, followed by Chelci Banks' career-high seven stuffs and five from veteran Miray Bolukbasi.
The Owls have won three of the last four meetings, however dating back to their first-ever match in 2017, the Bulls have won 15 of the 25 matches in the all-time series.

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Volleyball Closes Out Regular Season Road Schedule in Florida

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Chelci Banks

Miray Bolukbasi

Falanika Danielson

Taylor Davenport

Gem Grimshaw

Katerina Papazoglou

Patrycja Zielinska

Temple University Athletics

Volleyball Closes Out Regular Season Road Schedule in Florida

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Chelci Banks

Miray Bolukbasi

Falanika Danielson

Taylor Davenport

Gem Grimshaw

Katerina Papazoglou

Patrycja Zielinska

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