The Blue Devils were inches away from a sweep of TCU when they had a match point in the third set Friday night, with a kill attempt from Horned Frogs hitter Sarita Mikals sneaking just inside the baseline.
Duke had victory in its sights again numerous times in a marathon fourth set, and yet again when it took an 11-9 lead in the deciding fifth set.
But after two hours and 44 minutes of play at Cameron Indoor Stadium, it was TCU celebrating on the court with a 21-25, 23-25, 26-24, 29-27, 15-13 comeback victory, handing the Blue Devils their second loss in two days.
“It’s important that our team realizes that we should have—could have—had that,” Duke head coach Jolene Nagel said. “They should feel really sick about it tonight because it was there for them to take. We hurt ourselves with some unforced errors tonight.”
With a commanding two-set lead, the Blue Devils (3-2) appeared to seize control of the third set and the match when a 10-3 run put them ahead of the Horned Frogs 16-11. But TCU quickly erased the deficit with five straight points, as sophomore Anna Walsh converted four straight kills and senior Jillian Bergeson added a kill to even the set at 16.
The two teams traded points until Duke earned a match point at 24-23, but Mikals delivered the most important of her team-leading 16 kills to keep the Horned Frogs (4-0) alive. Another two kills for TCU sent the match to a fourth set.
“We’ve got to finish when we have an opportunity,” Nagel said. “We could have made our lives a lot easier by just buckling down in that third set. This team has to learn from that.”
The Blue Devils trailed for most of the fourth chapter of the marathon, but a kill by sophomore Leah Meyer punctuated a quick 3-0 run to give Duke its first lead at 21-20.
Meyer had 15 kills and hit .353 to lead the team in the losing effort and junior Anna Kropf, senior captain Jordan Tucker and freshman Jamie Stivers all finished with at least 14 kills. But none of the Blue Devil playmakers could deliver in crunch time to finish the match. After hitting better than .300 as a team in the first two sets, Duke hit worse than .200 in each of the last three sets.
“They’re a very physical team, and it was really tough to pick and find spots to hit,” Meyer said. “We just need to challenge ourselves to keep staying aggressive, keep swinging at the ball.”
After TCU regained control of the fourth set with three straight points of its own, Duke saved two set points with a kill by Kropf and an emphatic block by Tucker and freshman Natalie Schilling to level the score at 24.
The Horned Frogs and Blue Devils continued to trade kills to knot the set at 25, 26 and 27, including several tense rallies that gave both squads a chance to taste victory. Each team finished the match with more than 100 digs, a mark Duke had not reached since Oct. 23, 2015.
But when TCU had its sixth set point at 28-27, junior Kaylee Smith’s serve landed untouched in the middle of the court as the six Blue Devils on the floor all looked at each other, looking for somebody else to make a play on the ball.
Nobody did, and the Horned Frogs finished the fifth set on a 6-2 run, with five of their final six points coming on attack errors or service errors by the Blue Devils. The end of the match mishaps were a microcosm of a night in which Duke committed 25 attack errors, 15 service errors and two ball-handing errors.
Much like it did against North Carolina Thursday night, Duke came out strong and controlled the first set against TCU, leading by at least three points during the second half of the frame.
“One of the things that we really focus on is coming off and starting off strong, and we did that really well today coming out that first set firing,” Meyer said. “That’s something we need to continue to do throughout all five sets.”
In a much closer second set, neither team ever led by more than three. With the Blue Devils clinging to a 24-23 advantage, Stivers received a perfect set from classmate Cindy Marina and spiked the ball off the Horned Frogs’ block and out of bounds to stake Duke to a two-set lead.
It turned out to be the type of execution under pressure that Nagel’s squad sorely missed during the last three sets.
The Blue Devils will hope to bounce back from the disappointing two-game stretch thousands of miles away with three matches next weekend at the LBSU/CSUF Baden Invitational in Long Beach, Calif.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.