AUBURN, Ala. – Freshman Lauren Dreves (10 kills) and Madison Scheer (8 kills) drove Auburn’s high-powered offense on Tuesday evening to secure the Tigers’ fourth win of the season over Troy, 3-0 (25-19, 25-19, 25-18).
Auburn (4-0, 0-0) wasted little time setting the tone early and often against the Trojans (2-2, 0-0). Setters Kalei Edson and Peyton Dunn distributed the offense so evenly, it was hard for anyone in Neville Arena to tell who the set was going to. Dreves paved the way with three early kills while Scheer, Bel Zimmerman and Chelsey McCurdy each put down a pair.
Equally as impressive was the Orange and Blue’s presence at the net. Scheer, Dreves, Bella Bell, Emma Moore, Zimmerman and McCurdy all collected blocks, holding Troy’s hitting percentage to just .179.
Back in the lineup, libero Alexis Dacosta didn’t skip a beat. Dacosta sprawled out for a match-high 14 digs, six more than any player on either team. In three matches with the Orange and Blue, Dacosta is yet to finish with less than 14 digs.
Serving runs from Edson and Scheer late allowed the Tigers to create an arm’s length between them and the Trojans and take the early lead.
Beginning the second set at the service line, Dreves took her game and the match to a whole new level. While the Vancouver, Washington native only recorded one ace, she forced Troy out of system during a point-scoring run that saw Auburn open the second frame on an 11-0 run.
At the end of the night, Dreves finished with a career-high 10 kills on .450 hitting, four digs and an ace.
Not to be outdone, fellow outside hitter Madison Scheer was just as lethal. Scheer put down three kills in the second stanza as the Tigers cruised to a comfortable two-set advantage. The pride of Eureka, Missouri was nearly perfect, slamming home eight kills with no errors to hit a monstrous .533. She would add three blocks as well.
Bella Bell and Bel Zimmerman jumped in on the action to ring their respective bells. Bella Bella conjured a team-high five kills in the final set, closely followed by Zimmerman’s four.
Stout serving, including an ace from Fallan Lanham, once again helped the Tigers stay on track.
In the end, 10.5 team blocks and a season-high .369 hitting percentage were enough for Auburn’s third sweep of the season in its first four matches.
Match Notes
- Auburn begins the season 4-0 for the fourth consecutive season
- The Tigers’ 10.5 blocks were a season-high
- Auburn’s .369 was a season-best and the first time the team has managed a mark over .300 this year
- The Tigers are now 19-0 under Brent Crouch when hitting .300 or more
- Crouch is now 39-0 all-time when his teams hit north of .300
- Lauren Dreves’ 10 kills marked a career-best
- Madison Scheer’s .533 hitting percentage was a season-high
- Alexis Dacosta (14 digs) has reached double-digits in each of the three matches she’s played in at Auburn
- Chelsey McCurdy’s five blocks were the most this season and the most since recording eight last September against Ole Miss
What Crouch had to say
Opening statement…
“Every match, I think we did better than the one before. There’s continuing to be some comfort zone there about who to set and when. Hitters are getting in rhythm a little bit more. It was great to see Lauren Dreves play well tonight. When your left sides combine for .500, you are going to win. And that really was the difference today, both of them were hitting for high efficiency. We’ve had really good attacks on the right side already but for both the lefts to go off like this, it was good to see.”
On the upcoming matches with Cal Poly and Florida State…
“The way that we scheduled things, we just don’t have a lot of practice time in between matches. We saw some things that were good tonight but despite having 10-plus blocks, I thought we should have had 20. There are some things we need to tighten up a bit and we’re just not going to have a ton of time to do it.
Despite the score tonight, this is the best team we’ve played so far. Cal Poly will be the best team we’ve played after Thursday and then Florida State will be the best team we’ve played. It’s moving in the right direction in terms of strength of schedule. It’ll be a good challenge.