In its last home stand of the season, Georgetown women’s volleyball fell to Butler and Xavier, extending its losing streak to 10 matches.
Georgetown closes out the season with a home record of 1-11, finding stiff competition throughout the Big East when the opponents travel to D.C. The Hoyas look to break the streak on the road now in their final two matches against Creighton and Providence.
The Hoyas (6-23, 2-14 Big East) nearly found that elusive victory in a hotly contested match with Butler (19-14, 8-8 Big East) that saw the Hoyas push the Bulldogs to five sets. The Hoyas played the Bulldogs tough, dropping the first set 25-20, despite a 6-2 scoring run to tie things up at 20 points apiece.
The fourth set was a must-win for the Hoyas, and sophomore outside hitter Liv King came through in a big way, leading the Hoyas to a 26-24 win.
With the Hoya offense pulling through to force a fifth set, Butler turned the heat on from the opening, jumping out to an 8-4 lead. This lead coupled with the drain of fighting to push it to a fifth set proved to be too difficult an obstacle for the Hoyas, who lost the set 15-6 and the match 3-2.
The match against Xavier (17-12, 11-5 Big East) came on senior night, where Williams and setter Caitlin Brauneis were honored for their past four years of dedication to the program. In their last match of the season, Brauneis contributed five digs, and Williams shared the team lead of seven kills for the match.
The Hoyas could not give their seniors the victory, as they were not able to stop Xavier from going on big scoring runs throughout the sets. The second set saw the Hoyas play much tighter volleyball, especially behind Speech’s six kills, but after a 19-19 tie Xavier was able to score on six out of eight points to take it, 25-21.
Xavier’s 20-13 lead in the final set lead proved insurmountable, and the Hoyas fell 25-18 despite strong efforts from sophomore libero Kenzie Higareda on defense, tallying 10 digs – a team high for the Hoyas. Higareda is now sitting at 979 digs on her career, only 21 away from 1,000 career digs, a feat only accomplished by nine other Hoyas in program history.
Higareda will have an opportunity to reach this mark in Georgetown’s final two matches of the season, as the team also looks to break its losing streak on the road. The Hoyas look to pull the upset on the road in Omaha, Neb., against Creighton, before they travel to Providence, R.I., to take on the Providence Friars, who currently sit in last place in the conference with only one conference win this year.
Georgetown will take on Creighton this Friday at 8 p.m., followed by Providence on Sunday at 1 p.m. in the season finale.
