Dominican Republic dominated Canada with wide advantage in blocking (10-4) for a 3-0 win (25-15, 25-23, 25-17) at the XXI Women’s Senior Volleyball Pan American Cup in Leon, Guanajuato.
The Dominican Republic finished Pool A with a 4-1 record, awaiting last night’s result between Colombia and Mexico to know their final position, but assured to be in the quarterfinal round.
Canada with 2-3 will play the matches for positions 7 to 10 starting against Cuba.
In addition to outblocking Canada, the Dominicans had the advantage in attack (38-34). Both teams scored 4 service points and the Dominican Republic committed fewer unforced errors (12-23).
Dominican outside hitter Yonkaira Peña scored 16 points all in attack. Middle blocker Candida Arias contributed 11, including a match-high 6 blocks.
Opposite Lucy Borowski scored 10 points for Canada.
Dominican Republic’s blocking was key to take the first set by a wide margin, scoring five points on that basis from five different players.
After a tie at 11 points in the second, Canada jumped out to a four-point lead (17-13) thanks to the effective blocking-attacking of Abagayle Guezen and attacking of Avery Heppell. The Dominicans worked orderly to recover forcing Canada to commit errors and finally Yonkaira Peña put the team up, but tied again at 22 and 23 points, until a service error by Canada and then a service point by Samaret Caraballo sentenced the set.
In the third and final set, Dominican Republic was always on top and in the same way as the previous set, Caraballo won the match with an effective serve.
Marcos Kwiek, coach of Dominican Republic: “We did the necessary work to win in three sets. The team has been improving with each match. Today we played at a good level against a very strong opponent. We have to keep improving. We will possibly play a quarterfinal match. One game at a time.”
Shannon Winzer, coach of Canada: “I think there are big differences between the Dominican Republic and us. We asked our attackers to hit high and try to hit the hands, and the mistakes we made were related to that. Dominican is a very physical team, and we were trying to play against that. Where do I feel most frustrated? It’s that as soon as we get to the end of the game, we become undisciplined; and that’s the difference between playing at the senior A level and not. You have to play with discipline, whether it’s the first ten points or the last five points, I think that’s our problem right now.”
Source:Hoy.com.do
