The volleyball team suffered another heartbreaking five-game loss last night at Cameron Indoor Stadium as No. 17 Maryland queaked out a victory, 8-15, 15-7, 10-15, 15-10, 15-10.
The loss dropped Duke to 9-12 overall and 5-4 in the Atlantic Coast Conference, while the Terrapins improved to 18-0 overall and 9-0 in the ACC. The Blue Devils have struggled in five-game matches this year, losing all five in which they have been involved. On the other hand, Maryland is undefeated in all four of its five-game matches.
Duke started the match by winning the first game rather easily, 15-8, as it pulled away midway through the game. Maryland began the second game on fire jumping out to a 5-1 lead and going on to win 15-7.
Duke answered in this see-saw affair by winning the third set behind strong blocking. With the Blue Devils up 11-10 in the third game, the front line came up with four blocks to close out the scoring.
Unfortunately for Duke, Maryland controlled the last two games of the match. The Terrapins jumped out to early leads in both games and Duke could not manage a comeback.
"We always peak near the end of the game," senior outside hitter Maureen Reindl said. "If we start too far down, it's almost too late for us to comeback strong."
In the two games Duke won, the score remained close early before the Blue Devils made their run near the end. In the three games they lost, that was certainly not the case.
Passing seemed to dictate the efficiency of Duke's offense. The games the Blue Devils passed well, they won; the games they passed poorly, they lost. Senior setter Kristen Campbell, the recipient of the passes, led Duke with 56 assists.
"Passing makes a difference in every game, but especially a game like this when they have a big block," Campbell said. "When there's a good pass, it gives me the option to try and get my hitters one-on-one with their blocker, but when it's a bad pass, our offense becomes really predictable."
The Blue Devils-led by Sarah Peifer's 26 kills and 23 digs and Reindl with 15 kills and 22 digs-at times dominated the 17th-ranked Terrapins. But in the end, Maryland proved to be too much. The Blue Devils seemed to have the momentum going into game four, having finished game three with four straight points, but Maryland slammed the door on the underdogs.
"We were pretty confident going into the fifth game," Reindl said. "That's why it hit us so hard when we started getting down."
In the fifth game, which is scored with rally-scoring, a team can not afford to lose early points. But that is exactly what happened to Duke. Maryland scored seven of the first eight points in the deciding game. Duke struggled to stay in the game, twice closing the margin to two points, but Maryland answered each time.
"I think that we played really hard," Campbell said. " I know we really wanted to win. When it came down to it in the fifth game, I think we were a little disappointed with how we fought."
On a positive note, Duke has shown that they can play with every team in the ACC. This should serve as a confidence booster throughout the remaining schedule and into the ACC tournament.
"We're improving every time," Reindl said. "We have confidence we can beat [Maryland]. Tonight we didn't even play that well."
"I think we've always known we can play against these teams," Campbell said. "When it comes down to it, we need to be able to fight."
Duke still has a lot of games left this season and is gaining confidence as the season progresses. The Blue Devils have proved that they can play with teams such as Maryland, now all that is left is to beat these teams, a goal definitely within their reach. The Blue Devils return to action tomorrow night when they host Virginia at 8 p.m. Duke beat the Cavaliers in Charlottesville earlier this year, 3-0.
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