After having its 10-game winning streak snapped last weekend against rival North Carolina, No. 20 Duke bounced back Friday at Cameron Indoor Stadium against a tough Clemson blocking team.
The Blue Devils swept the Tigers in three sets—25-20, 25-21 and 25-22. Duke was led by sophomore libero Sasha Karelov, who recorded 26 digs in just three sets. The sophomore received significant help from her outside hitters, with senior Jeme Obeime registering 15 kills while junior Emily Sklar recorded a double-double with 12 kills and 16 digs.
“Seeing my teammates have my back made me want to play more relaxed,” Karelov said. “I was having a good time out there. I wasn’t thinking about every dig or every pass, I was just playing my game and my teammates really helped me with that.”
In the first set, Clemson (14-7, 3-5 in the ACC) jumped out to an early 3-1 lead, capitalizing on well-placed sets and a poorly-spaced Blue Devil defense. However, outside hitter Breanna Atkinson had a block and a pair of vicious kills to help give Duke its first lead of the game at 5-4. The Blue Devils (16-4, 8-1) capitalized on this momentum to score four of the next five points.
Clemson wouldn’t take the lead again until the score was 15-14. At 17-14, Blue Devil head coach Jolene Nagel was forced to call a timeout to calm her team down and get focused.
“We were making too many errors and giving them too many opportunities, so we had to talk about that,” Nagel said. “We just needed to control the ball a little bit better.”
Coming out of the timeout, Duke rattled off four quick points behind three kills from Obeime and another from Sklar, forcing the Tigers to call a timeout of their own at 18-17.
Obeime, however, wouldn’t allow the timeout to do Clemson much good. A block and two consecutive kills from the Carmel, Ind., native forced another Tiger timeout at 22-19. Both teams traded points before Obeime put down her eight kill of the day to make it set point at 24-20. On the ensuing play, a misfire from Clemson sent the ball careening out of bounds, securing at early 1-0 lead for Duke.
With Obeime spending her time accumulating kills above the net, Karelov spent her time diving all over the court, amassing nine digs in the first set. This continued into the second frame, as Karelov fought for an additional eight digs, well above her already-impressive average of 5.3 digs per set.
“I’m really excited for her,” Nagel said. “Sasha’s doing a great job in the libero position. She works very hard on it and she’s very hard on herself. For her to come out and have a night like that was great for her, and great for us.”
The second set featured many of the same themes as the first set, with the teams battling back and forth to the tune of eight ties and four lead changes. Middle blocker Jordan Tucker opened the set with a powerful kill, galvanizing the Blue Devils to an early lead. Clemson would retaliate with five in a row before Duke could tie the set at 5-5.
A long set would ensue, characterized by lengthy rallies. The Blue Devils held a slim 20-19 lead during one rally when Obeime won the point on a punctuating spike. A thunderous kill from Tucker on the next play sent the crowd into a frenzy. After a timeout, Duke had no problem closing out the set 25-21 and securing a strong advantage over the Tigers entering the pivotal third set.
“We know that Clemson is a team that really comes out hard in the third set, so we had no reason to relax,” Obeime said. “We acted like it was the first set so we had to come out and win it.”
Tucker opened the set with the same spike that fans grew accustomed to seeing from her Friday night, seizing the 1-0 early lead. Clemson never held a lead in third set, although the Tigers did tie the score three different times, including at 18-18. However, the combination of another nine digs from Karelov, four digs from setter Kelsey Williams and a well-rounded Duke offense proved too much for Clemson to recover from. The Blue Devils won the set handily 25-22.
With just nine games left in the season, the Blue Devils will look to maintain their high level of play as they contend for a second straight conference crown.
"Every match is important, every opponent is going to be as hard as the other one,” Obeime said. “We need to make sure we focus on the fundamentals and just play Duke volleyball.”
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