Tulsa Volleyball sweeps Southern Miss

Golden Hurricane Volleyball moves to 6-1 in C-USA with a 3-0 victory over Southern Mississippi.  Kellie Culbertson, Tyler Henderson and Diana Silva each tallied double-digit kills as the Tulsa volleyball team earned a 3-0 (27-25, 25-18, 25-23) win Sunday afternoon at the Donald W. Reynolds Center.

The Golden Hurricane improved to 15-5 overall and 6-1 in C-USA play, while Southern Miss fell to 7-11 overall and 1-5 in league play.

Culbertson had a double-double with 11 kills and 19 digs, while Henderson recorded 14 kills and Silva tallied 13 kills with nine digs. Kelsey Hancock added nine kills with a .350 attack percentage and Jessica Adams tallied 15 digs.

Bailey Clampitt led TU with 26 assists, while Jordan Clampitt recorded 23 assists. Both setters added seven digs.

Tulsa hit .243 as a team (56-20-148) with 56 kills, 53 assists, two service aces, 62 digs and 5.0 blocks. Southern Miss hit .178 (41-18-129) with 41 kills, 40 assists, two aces, 62 digs and 7.0 blocks.

“I was proud of our defense overall for the weekend,” Tulsa Head Coach Steven McRoberts said.

“We held them to a pretty respectable percentage on both days. Today, it seemed like there were a lot more runs, especially in sets two and three than there were yesterday. We’re going to have to do some things better, especially with UAB coming up on Friday. But I’m really pleased that we can get out of here with two three-set wins,” McRoberts added.

The teams went back and forth throughout the first set with 21 ties and seven lead changes. Tulsa converted 19 of 26 a tally of 73 percent of the sideout opportunities in the set, while Southern Miss converted 69 percent (18-26) of its sideouts. The Golden Hurricane had 20 kills and 23 digs, and the Golden Eagles had 21 kills and 27 digs in the frame. Culbertson had nine digs and six kills, Adams had eight digs, and Henderson had five kills.

Tulsa broke away from a 10-10 tie with USM midway through the second set with a 7-1 run to take a 17-11 lead, and cruise to the win. Silva led TU with five kills, while Hancock and Henderson each had four. Adams and Culbertson added five and four digs, respectively.

The Hurricane faced a 21-16 deficit in the third set, but closed the gap to one point with a 5-1 run. Down, 23-21, TU got kills from Miriele Gobbo, Jordan Clampitt and Henderson sandwiched around a USM attack error to win the set.

“The scores were almost a carbon copy of yesterday,” McRoberts said. “The first set went to extra points, the second set we won by a fair amount, and the third set was 25-23. It’s tough when you play a team back-to-back in a weekend. There were no secrets about what each of us was trying to do.”

The Golden Hurricane returns to action next weekend when it travels to UAB and Memphis. TU plays at UAB Friday at 7 p.m. and at Memphis Sunday at 1 p.m.

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