The ASU beach volleyball team concluded their 2018 campaign with a 1-2 record at the Pac-12 Beach Volleyball Championships in Stanford, California.
The Arizona State beach volleyball team wrapped up their fifth season in program history Friday evening falling to the Washington Huskies by a score of 4-1 in the second day of the Pac-12 Conference Tournament.
The Sun Devils entered the weekend as the No. 7 seed in a nine-team tournament bracket. ASU’s first round matchup would pit them against the No. 2 USC Trojans, who had won the last two beach volleyball national championships.
After pushing the Trojans to two tight matches in the regular season, the Sun Devils struggled in postseason play, amounting just one match win against a team that’s likely to make another run for a title.
ASU’s No. 3 lineup of Katelyn Carballo and Ellyson Lundberg amounted their second match win against USC this season, defeating Joy Dennis and Cammie Dorn in straight set scores of 21-16 and 21-19.
Kate Baldwin and Samantha Plaster, the No. 5 pair that defeated USC in both regular season meetings, fell in consecutive 21-16 sets to Haley Hallgren and Alexandra Poletto.
The Sun Devils made the decision to stick with Natalie Braun and Frances Giedraitis in the No. 2 lineup, but the duo struggled against a talented pairing of Terese Cannon and Sammy Slater, falling by set scores of 21-12 and 21-7.
ASU’s No. 1 and No. 4 pairs would fight hard in close first sets, but each would fall by an average of nine points in their respective second sets.
The loss placed the Sun Devils in the contender’s bracket, where they’d square off against No. 9 Oregon looking to remain alive in the tournament.
This time, ASU would dominate their opposition, sweeping the Ducks by a score of five matches to none.
Each Sun Devil lineup won in consecutive sets during the match, showing the ability to control the ball and keep the Duck defense indecisive about where each attack would land.
The win put the Sun Devils in position to face No. 6 Washington, a team they had defeated during the Pac-12 South Invitational last month.
Despite a bounce-back victory for Plaster and Baldwin in the No. 5 match, the Sun Devils would drop the rest of the matches in what would be their final match of their 2018 season.
Carballo and Lundberg put forth a valiant effort in the No. 3 match, coming back from a 30-28 first set loss to force a third set against Carly Dehoog and Shayne McPherson. After trading points back and forth in the final frame, the Huskies would walk away with a tight 16-14 victory.
The match would prove to be the final time that Kwyn Johnson, Mia Rivera and Giedraitis would play in a match for the ASU beach volleyball program. Seniors Sydney Palmer and Halle Harker will also not be present on the Sun Devil roster next season.
In spite of the losses, coach Brad Keenan has a lot to work with in his young returnees. Baldwin and Plaster exhibited excellent chemistry in their freshman seasons, and ASU’s winningest pair, Carballo and Lundberg, will be around for two more years on the sand.
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Although the Devils couldn’t add on from last season’s win total, the future for this young program will give them plenty of opportunities to improve.