Lady Vols Battle Back to Win in Five at Georgia

Sunday, October 28

Athens, GA

2 pm

University of Tennessee

18-5, 9-2

Georgia

12-10, 3-8

Tennessee

Georgia

October 28, 2018 | Volleyball

Box Score

Tennessee captures ninth with in SEC play in comeback fashion behind a career-high 27 kills from Tessa Grubbs

By: Andy Kovar

ATHENS, Ga. -- The University of Tennessee volleyball team came back from 2-0 down to defeat the Georgia Bulldogs in five sets.

Backed by a career-high 27 kills from junior Tessa Grubbs, Tennessee (18-5, 9-2 Southeastern Conference) took the final three sets in the match to improve to 9-2 in SEC play. The Lady Vols never trailed in the final three sets and led the fourth and fifth frames wire-to-wire to defeat Georgia (12-10, 3-8 SEC).

For Grubbs, 15 of her game-high 27 kills came in the final three frames including five in the fifth set. The Tega Cay, S.C. native hit .625 percent in the fifth set with no errors. Her first three in the set helped Tennessee jump out to a 5-3 advantage as the Lady Vols took the decisive set in wire-to-wire fashion closing it out 15-11 over the Bulldogs.

After dropping the first two frames, the Tennessee offense exploded in the third set. The team hit .406 on with the help of five kills from freshman Lily Felts and Grubbs and four from senior Erica Treiber.

Felts totaled those five kills on just five swings with the final ending the set with a back-row kill at 25-19.

All three players would finish in double-figures, making Tennessee 10-1 on the season when three players finish with double-digit kills.

Along with Grubbs, Treiber stayed hot in the fourth set totaling five kills on seven swings with no errors (.714 hitting percentage). Despite a late run from the Bulldogs, Tennessee led the entire way to force a fifth set. A kill from junior Alyssa Andreno ended the frame at 25-22 in favor of the Lady Vols.

Tennessee moves to 47-28 all-time against Georgia, the most wins over any opponent in the SEC and overall.

From Coach Rackham:
On Tessa Grubbs' match:
"We rely on her so much to score points and she continues to come through for us in big moments. She got all kinds of sets tonight – in system, out of system. She's been reliable for us and especially in the third. She carried us pretty much the rest of the match." – Coach Eve Rackham

On team's ability to come back and win in five:
"Certainly, you never want to go down 0-2 especially on the road. I think this team has a lot of confidence in themselves and in each other. They were able to win that third set. I told them, 'hey, if we just get this one we can refocus and it's a different match.' We found a way to grind it out in the third and definitely in the fourth. Certainly once we got to the fifth, our team knows what to do and stays within what we train." Coach Eve Rackham

From Tessa Grubbs:
On career-high 27 kill night:
"Offensively, it works great tonight. The middles pulled their middles so it opened up a lot for me. Also having high hands to hit off of and great liberos like Madison Coulter and Brooke Schumacher to help me with what to hit." -- Tessa Grubbs

On team's resiliency:
"We just have a bunch of determination knowing how far we want to go and how badly we want to reach our goals. We want to make it to the tournament and make it far in the tournament. Coming back in these fifth sets, it is testing us. Down 0-2 we were just thinking we need to get our mind right in order to accomplish those goals." – Tessa Grubbs

Standout Stat:

Tennessee moves to 4-2 in five-set matches this season and the Lady Vols are 4-0 in five setters in conference play. This is the first such win where they battled back from two sets down to win this season.

Match Notables:

Erica Treiber finished the match with a .520 hitting percentage marking the 13th time this season and fifth time in conference play that she has hit over .400 in a match. Tennessee is 11-2 in the matches. She sits just 11 kills away from reaching 1,000 for her career. She would be the 20th member of the 1,000 kill club in Tennessee history.
With a match-high 24 digs, Brooke Schumacher now has 1,300 in her career at Tennessee. The senior passed Nikki Fowler for seventh in program history. She needs just 38 digs to enter the top five.
In the last four matches, junior Tessa Grubbs is averaging 4.71 kills per set which is nearly a kill better than her season average of 3.97 kills per set. In 19 matches played she has led the team in kills 11 times and had double-digit kills 17 times.

Next Up:
Tennessee is back on the road as it heads to Oxford, Miss. to face off against the Ole Miss Rebels on Friday. The Rebels are coming off of a five-set loss to Auburn on Friday night and sit 2-8 through 10 matches in conference play entering their Sunday night match with Auburn

The match will air on SEC Network+ with the first serve scheduled for 7:30 p.m. (ET) in Oxford, Miss.