Despite a successful 3-2 win Friday night against Miami, Duke was unable to carry over the momentum Sunday in Tallahassee, losing to Florida State 3-2 after winning the first two sets.
In a matchup between the ACC’s two preseason favorites, the Blue Devils (17-4, 9-2 in the ACC) came away with solid 25-19 and 25-21 wins in the first and second sets, respectively, before allowing a pair of Seminoles—Jekaterina Stepanova and Stephanie Neville—to combine for 11 kills and finish the third set 25-21, turning the tide for No. 24 Florida State (15-6, 7-4).
With a change in momentum, the reigning ACC champions were able to come out on top in the final two sets 25-20 and 15-13, aided by the duo of Stepanova and Neville who combined for 25 kills in the final three sets and 36 total.
“We knew it’d be a battle, and we were up two games to nothing, and we worked very hard to put ourselves up in that position,” Duke head coach Jolene Nagel said. “I think we had a little bit of a let up in game three and dug ourselves in a hole that was too big for us to make up later.”
Even with the Seminoles hitting .243 and leading Duke in blocks 12.5-10, the Blue Devils led Florida State in every other statistical category. In the end, though, Duke was doomed by its 26 errors to the Seminoles’ 21.
The Blue Devils did see stellar performance from some of its players, however, such as junior Sophia Dunworth, who reached a career-high 22 kills and hit .375. Sophomore middle blocker Christina Gray hit at a .500 clip with 13 kills, and senior Becci Burling added 17 kills and five blocks Sunday.
In Duke’s 3-2 win Friday over Miami, Burling made Blue Devil history, becoming only the 19th Duke player to hit the 1,000th career kill mark after posting 21 kills in Coral Gables.
The Blue Devils had five players who reached double-digit kills and were able to finish off the Hurricanes despite struggling defensively in the first two sets, allowing Miami (15-6, 5-5) to hit .333 and .361 in the first and second periods, respectively.
“The win on Friday night was a really big win—our team rallied and came out there and battled for the win,” Nagel said. “It’s a real tribute to our kids mentally and physically, and [Sunday], we just weren’t able to pull it out, but I do think that we’re going to learn from this and get better for next weekend.”
With a loss to Florida State, Duke drops to a first-place tie with North Carolina and will return to Cameron Indoor Stadium Friday to take on Clemson at 7 p.m.
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