:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/20694725/20130906_wv_027_mb.0.jpg)
It's not often that you see the home team being gracious and helping the road team win. But that's kind of what Georgetown did on Friday night, committing 17 attack errors and four service errors, allowing Marquette to build early leads in both of the first two sets and end up rolling to a 3-0 (25-14, 25-20, 25-21) win.
The first set was even easier than I've already let on. The Hoyas committed six attack errors and Marquette landed six aces, including four from Autumn Bailey alone. The Golden Eagles opened up leads of 10-5 and 16-9 en route to starting out with a win while only needing 10 kills to compile their 25 points.
Seven Georgetown attack errors helped MU grab a 23-14 lead in the second set after a Lindsey Gosh kill. Yet, the Hoyas were able to run off six straight points, including three kills from Alex Johnson, to make the final score look much more interesting than the set actually was. A Jackie Kocken kill finally broke the run and little used sub Casey Read closed things out.
Coming back from intermission, Georgetown was a much tougher team. Things went back and forth and the score was knotted up at 11. That's when Annalee Abell committed a service error for GU, allowing Gosh to take a try at serving. The powerful lefty ripped off three straight aces, and all of a sudden MU had a 15-11 lead. No one managed more than two points in a row until the score hit 23-18 in favor of the Golden Eagles. A kill and an ace from Johnson on either side of a kill from Lauren Saar pulled Georgetown within two, but Elizabeth Koberstein dished up kills to Bailey and then Meghan Niemann to close out the match in straight sets.
Marquette hit .410 as a team, with Bailey, Niemann, Kocken and Gosh all hitting better than .350. Bailey led the squad in kills with 12, while Ellie Rauch had the team high in digs with 11. Koberstein had 32 assists, including 26 in the second two sets, as she became the seventh setter in MU history to reach the 2,000 assists mark. It's a testament to head coach Bond Shymansky's system that Koberstein has hit that milestone in just 47 matches. Koberstein sits at 2,016 assists in her Marquette career, just 71 behind Mary Donohue for 6th place all time.
Marquette moves to 9-4 on the season and 2-0 in Big East matches. Georgetown falls to 6-9 and remains winless through two conference matches.
Up Next: It's a quick turnaround for MU as they make the jaunt from D.C. to just northwest of Philadelphia to play Villanova (10-5, 2-0) tonight. Marquette will do their part to break up the 2-0 logjam at the top of the Big East standings, while 2-0 Xavier takes on Creighton a few hours earlier. Yes, you read that right, XAVIER is the team that's 2-0, not Creighton, as the nationally ranked Bluejays dropped their first ever Big East match last night to Butler, even if their own website is confused about that.