Earlier in the week coach Mary Wise warned her players that despite South Carolina’s last-place standing, it was going to test Florida with defense and constant effort.
Through two sets, it looked like she might have been right.
But then the Gators (19-1, 12-0 Southeastern Conference) took their game to another level and showed a national TV audience why they’re the No. 1 team in the nation, rattling off a 25-13 third set to beat the Gamecocks (5-17, 2-10 SEC) 3-0 (25-20, 25-17, 25-13) Wednesday night in the O’Connell Center.
Senior Callie Rivers and junior Kelly Murphy led the way for Florida, as each recorded 11 kills and five digs against South Carolina.
Murphy hit .375 for the match, while Rivers went errorless on her way to a .524 hitting efficiency.
“Callie’s play, both back row and front row, was pretty special today,” Wise said. “She had it going. She was in a zone serving, passing and hitting. It was just one of those nights where it was like the game was going slow motion for her because she just saw the whole court, and really it was one of the best performances of her career, fun to watch.”
Rivers also led the Gators with four aces, three of which came during a 10-0 run after South Carolina took the opening point of the third set.
Rivers’ fourth service ace came later in the same set, and only a questionable call kept her from another one.
“That was one of the things we worked on this week in practice, we worked on a ton of serving,” Rivers said.
“I think serving is one of our identities. We try to be really tough servers and work on different types of serves, so I’m glad it worked in this game.”
For the match, the Gators recorded nine aces and nine blocks, proving why they’re in the top 25 in the nation in both categories.
South Carolina was able to hang around in the match and force a number of scramble points through effective defense.
Although they only tallied two blocks, the Gamecocks combined for 38 digs, led by senior libero Hannah Lawing who had 16 for the match and 10 in the first set.
“I think South Carolina did really well defensively,” Rivers said. “They have one of the best liberos in the SEC and she played great against us.”
But her efforts were not nearly enough, as the Gators were able to use a strong serving and blocking performance to hold South Carolina to just .057 hitting, including -.042 in the final set.
