Photo by: Tony Leon/ActionWestPhotography.com

ORANGE, Calif. – The Whittier College Volleyball team remains hot as they won their third in a row Friday night as they took out Chapman University on the road 25-18, 25-22, 22-25, 25-18.

Whittier is coming off wins over Caltech and Redlands and remain in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) playoff hunt as they improve to 5-10, 3-3 SCIAC.

The Purple & Gold hit .277 as a team, which included a .343 and .323 average in the second and third sets.  The Poets trailed in the first set 10-6 but went on an ensuing 7-0 run behind kills from Camryn Purdom (Moreno Valley, Calif.), Corie Hammock (Portland, OR), and Aubrey Caires (Garnderville, NV) that put WC in front 13-10.

The lead increased to 17-11 for Whittier as they capitalized on three errors by CU, while Olive Anagu (Culver City, Calif.) and Caires combined for back-to-back kills.  Chapman attempted to get back into the frame but the Poets answered them point for point before closing out the set with four straight sparked by two kills from Anagu. 

The second set produced six ties as the Poets and Panthers traded points.  Anagu and Caires again came up big with kills that put WC in front 14-10 and the lead would hold as a 4-0 run late would move the score to 22-18 before an ace by Jasmine Tong (Fullerton, Calif.) and kills by Anagu and Caires would put Chapman in a hole 2-0. 

Chapman battled back in the third despite the Poets hitting .323 as a team.  CU used a couple aces and four key kills that helped cut the deficit in half. 

But their comeback hopes would stall in the fourth as Whittier would open up the stanza 10-4 before using five straight that opened the set up 20-13 following two service aces from Anagu and a kill from Jazmyn Sudbrook-Johnson (Fremont, Calif.).  Chapman used one final run winning three of the next four points to pull within five but that's as close as they would get as Alaina Rhee (Kent, WA) and Anagu would strike the final blow with the final two kills of the match.

Rebecca Slattery (Los Altos, Calif.) finished with 15 kills,  Anagu totaled 14 on 29 attempts for a .345 hitting percentage, while registering eight digs.

Caires totaled nine kills and had three blocks and Sudbrook-Johnson picked up seven.  Purdom and tong divvied up the assists with 19 and 18, each respectively.  Clarissa Standafer (Alta Loma, Calif.) recorded 18 digs in the back row, while Alexis Mills (Rancho Cucamonga, Calif.) finished with a career high seven blocks.           

Whittier has a tough match-up on the road this afternoon as they take on Claremont-M-S beginning at 4:00pm.