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ASU Volleyball: Lack of depth cause ASU to struggle against Oregon

By Nicholas Zeller-Singh

TEMPE, AZ - AUGUST 28: Arizona State Sun Devils mascot, "Sparky" performs during the college football game against the Weber State Wildcats at Sun Devil Stadium on August 28, 2014 in Tempe, Arizona. The Sun Devils defeated the Wildcats 45-14. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
TEMPE, AZ - AUGUST 28: Arizona State Sun Devils mascot, "Sparky" performs during the college football game against the Weber State Wildcats at Sun Devil Stadium on August 28, 2014 in Tempe, Arizona. The Sun Devils defeated the Wildcats 45-14. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images) /
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ASU volleyball got swept against No. 16 Oregon (25-23, 25-18, 25-21) as the lack of depth causes the young Sun Devils team to lose their fifth straight.

The Sun Devils came in with the perfect game plan to beat No. 16 Oregon for the second time this year and bounce back at home.

“Our game plan was to get them out of system and hit the serves,” said Tomasevic, “but we missed long because we needed to serve tough”.

The game plan was highly ineffective with the lack of help from the starters and bench and Tomasevic realized that too.

“It’s a part of rebuilding, we don’t have a lot of depth on the bench,” Tomasevic said.

Coming into the game the Sun Devils were down Ivana Jeremic due to illness which caused the offense to try and rely on Alyse Ford for the third game straight.

However, without Jeremic, the Ducks middle blockers did not allow Ford to heat up as the Ducks finished with nine blocks in the night.

Going into the game, Ford was the main offensive threat since they were down Jeremic.

Tomasevic stated, “We didn’t have Alyse for the longest period of time and I challenged her from the beginning of the match to be the one who leads the way.”

This continued throughout the night as Ford was not a weapon causing the Sun Devils lineup to drop another key weapon to the offense.

The offense then began looking for Claire Kovensky to pick up her game and try to lead the team. Claire ended up the night with the most attacks at 33, but only finished with eight kills, second highest on the team.

With the outside hitters struggling to roll and the lineup deeply affected by a lack luster offensive performance, Megan Beedie and Carmen Unzue stepped up to fill in the offensive and defensive gaps, but Ronika Stone, Willow Johnson, and Lindse Vander Weide were to much too handle for a struggling lineup.

Also, with Jeremic out for the game and Ford struggling, Callie Jones started the match and got a lot more play time as she led the team with 13 assists and finished with two aces as well.

By the third set Tomasevic tried new things out as the team knew they could not bounce back and win three straight sets against the Ducks.

Tomasevic ended up using Danica Krstonocic a lot more as well as Halle Johnson subbing in and out with Ford, Keelie LeBlanc came into the match for a few points as Tomasevic also tested Peyton Grahovac after dealing with injuries throughout the season.

The offense finished with the second worst hitting percentage of the season at .074 and lost the digs battle as they finished with only 38 digs compared to the Ducks 46. Lastly, the Sun Devils errors keep adding up as the team is averaging 30.8 errors during the five-game losing streak.

Next. ASU Volleyball: Sun Devils begin homestand against Oregon schools. dark

ASU is looking to bounce back after losing five straight against Oregon State (10-12,  0-10) Sunday.

All quotes in this article were obtained firsthand by Devils in Detail unless otherwise noted.