The Winthrop volleyball team hosted the South Carolina Gamecocks in a non-conference match on Thursday, losing 3-0.
While the Eagles did not manage to win a set, they did play the Gamecocks close for the majority of the game. Winthrop lost the first two sets 25-18, and the final set 25-21.
“They served really well tonight against us, and we didn’t pass as well as we could at home,” said head coach Chuck Rey. “When we were at the net, we were able to get some good swings at the ball.
“I thought we were really productive and I thought our physicality showed [in] some ways equal to them in terms of some of our positions. It was really just a pass and serve thing tonight and they were better than us in that way.”
South Carolina came to Rock Hill without a top-25 ranking, but the Gamecocks had been ranked No. 24 in the nation the previous week and received the 27th amount of votes on the most recent coaches poll prior to their match against Winthrop.
The Eagles earned the first point of the match but soon trailed 5-2 after an early four-point run for the Gamecocks. The teams fought back and forth but Winthrop could not string together enough consecutive points to erase the deficit.
Winthrop once again got behind early in the second set as the Gamecocks won the first three points. The Eagles hung on and pulled the score back to within two (7-5) before a couple of calls from the officials that the Winthrop crowd questioned made the score 10-5.
“That’s just the way it goes sometimes. I think we got some calls our way tonight too and I think they evened out,” Rey said.
“Nobody’s perfect and I thought they (the officials) did a really good job. I don’t think that swayed the game.”
Winthrop looked its best all night in the third set. After South Carolina took the first two points, the Eagles kept the score within one or tied for all but one of the next 16 points.
Down 9-7, Winthrop went on its first 4-0 run of the night to capture a 11-9 lead. During the run, Winthrop recorded three kills — two from sophomore Brookelynn Thomas and one from fifth-year Morgan Bossler.
Winthrop’s rally was quickly squashed by South Carolina as the Gamecocks won six of the next seven points. The Eagles persisted and pulled back to within one (22-21) before conceding the final three points of the match to South Carolina.
Rey said the team made some adjustments after the second set that kept the third set closer.
“We are resilient and I told the team at the end there that we are a really good team,” Rey said. “We made some changes that were probably better — maybe thought we should’ve done that in the second set.”
Rey said the team switched to a 6-2 formation which allowed all the front row players to be hitters, as opposed to the 5-1 formation Winthrop ran at times throughout the first two sets, which put a setter on the front row.
“When we put in a little bit bigger block, it slowed them down enough which made it more competitive for us. If I was smarter maybe I would’ve done it earlier and we could’ve made a better match out of it,” Rey said.
Winthrop’s loss does not erase the fact that attendance for the game was the highest attendance for a volleyball match in Winthrop Coliseum since the 2019 Big South Tournament.
“It was awesome to have such a turnout tonight,” Rey said. “[That’s] part of the reason to bring South Carolina up — and we’re lucky cause we’re playing at such a high level that South Carolina’s willing to come up.
“The support in this community has always been good. Tonight you can see that, and I think with the Olympics this year and the gold medal from the women’s side, I think volleyball’s back on top again and it was good to see everybody here tonight.”
Winthrop will face its first conference opponent Friday when the Eagles take on Gardner-Webb University at 6 p.m. in Boiling Springs, NC. Rey said the teams Winthrop faces from the Big South won’t be as tough as the Gamecocks.
“We’re not going to see a team this physical in our conference, and to know that we can make those changes and still compete, it says a lot for where we’re gonna go,” Rey said.
