April 1, 2006

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The South Carolina volleyball team wrapped up competition in its first spring tournament on Saturday in Charlotte, N.C. The Gamecocks played four teams in two-game matches, posting five wins and three loses.

USC won both games in its first match of the day against Coastal Carolina, but lost both in its other morning contest with East Tennessee State. In the afternoon, the Gamecocks swept College of Charleston and split games with Miami (Ohio).

“Our defensive effort was right there all day,” South Carolina head coach Nancy Somera said. “When you go into a spring match, unless you know something about the other team, you don’t really have a scouting report. You have a limited amount of information, and I thought we executed well and had some success.

“We struggled when our passing game broke down. There were also too many missed serves throughout the day, but it was a good day in terms of getting better in some areas.”

Although unforced errors hurt the Gamecocks in the two games they lost to ETSU, they were able to remedy many of their mistakes against Charleston and Miami (Ohio).

“We made less errors in the last two games, and we were able to keep the ball in play and let our defense score some points,” Somera said. “When the defense gets more confident, the offense doesn’t feel like it has to put every ball away. If we could have decreased our errors today by 15 percent, we’d be where we need to be. That’s one or two less every game, and we are a much tougher team to beat when we aren’t beating ourselves.

“It was nice to see some players carry some things over from the practice gym to the court. There were many bright spots for us. We’ve got three more weeks of practice and now some good feedback of where we need to go.”

The next spring competition for the Gamecocks will be a home tournament Saturday, April 15. USC ends the semester at a tournament in Aurora, Ill., the following week.