Nov. 17, 2001

Knoxville, TN – Led by Cally Plummer’s 20 kills and 17 digs, the third seeded South Carolina Gamecocks defeated the host sixth seeded Tennessee Lady Volunteers at the SEC Volleyball Tournament in Knoxville, TN.

Game scores were 31-29, 20-30, 17-30, 30-27, and 15-9.

Nadia Sefferovich had 15 kills for the Gamecocks. Plummer also had 2 service aces for the Gamecocks.

The Gamecocks will now take on the Lady Razorbacks of Arkansas on Saturday at 4:30 p.m. in a semi-final match. In the other semi-final match, number one seed Florida will take on number five seed Alabama. Alabama defeated #4 seed Louisiana State 3-2 while Florida defeated #8 seed Georgia 3-0 earlier today. All matches are played at the Stokely Athletics Center at the University of Tennessee.

Carolina hit .184 while Tennessee hit .254 and Tennessee had more digs, 68-59. Coach quote “I want to give a lot of credit to Tennessee,” said Carolina Head Coach Kim Christopher. “They outworked us in games two and three. In game four, we were able to fight back and match their effort on the defensive side of the game. We played aggressive, but we weren’t near as aggressive against Tennessee as we were back in Columbia at our place. Cally Plummer was consistent throughout the whole match. Nadia Sefferovich picked up her game in game four. We had a lot of errors in games three and four, but we picked it up at the end.”

“Arkansas is really solid and their offensive attack primarily comes from three players and if we can contain those players, we will have a good shot at beating them. I didn’t feel like we were very sharp offensively tonight and that is something that we will need to be if we want to beat a good team like Arkansas.”

In game one, Tennessee jumped out to an early 3-1 lead, but Carolina battled back to tie the game at four and then took a 10-6 lead following a kill by Nadia Sefferovich and two aces by Cally Plummer. Tennessee came back to bring the score to 12-10, but Carolina jumped out once again to a 20-15 lead. Tennessee went on an 8-1 run to bring the score to a 23-21 Lady Vol lead. The game battled back and forth the rest of the way out. Cally Plummer notched a kill to give the Gamecocks a 29-28 lead. Tennessee tied the game at 29, but Carolina notched two straight points, capped off by a Megan Hosp kill, to win the game 31-29.

In game two, Tennessee once again jumped out in front early, this time taking an 8-4 lead before Carolina called a time out to regroup. The Gamecocks then battled back to pull within two to make the score 9-11, but Tennessee jumped out again, taking a 18-14 lead before Carolina used their second timeout. Unfortunately, four points would be as close as Carolina would get as Tennessee went on a 9-1 run to take the game to a 29-17 Lady Vol lead. Carolina staged a mini-rally late to make it a 20-29 Tennessee lead, but it was too little, too late as Tennessee took game two in a 30-20 victory.

In game three, Tennessee once again jumped out to an early 8-4 lead. South Carolina cut the Lady Vol lead to two as the score was 8-10, but Tennessee jumped ahead again to lead 10-20. The Gamecocks staged a small rally to bring the score to 17-23, but Tennessee went on a 7-0 run to finish game three with a Lady Vol 30-18 victory.

In game four, Tennessee jumped out to an early 9-3 lead, but Carolina charged back to come within three, 7-10, capped off by a Plummer kill. Tennessee went on a mini-rally, but a kill by Yajaira Cadet in her first game played since the Florida match on November 4th quickly stopped that. The Tennessee jumped ahead once again, taking a 14-18 lead, but Carolina fought their way back, taking a 22-20 lead, capped off by a Sefferovich block. Carolina jumped out ahead 27-23, capped off by a block assist by Cadet and Niece Curry. Tennessee came back to bring the score to a 27-25 Carolina lead, but the Gamecocks refused to give up and took game four, forcing a pivotal game five, by a score of 30-27.

In the pivotal game five, Tennessee jumped out to an early 2-0 lead, but Carolina refused to go quietly as they went on a 8-0 run and finally took game five, 15-9.