COSTA MESA – It took awhile for Vanguard to reacclimate to the Freed Center in Saturday's PacWest women's volleyball match against Dominican, but the Lions overcame a slow start to emerge victorious in four sets.

The Lions earned a 21-25, 25-14, 25-20, 25-13 victory over the Penguins to improve to 9-9 overall and 6-8 in the PacWest.

Having played just one home match over a 28-day period, with seven of their last eight matches on the road, the Lions came out sluggish in dropping the first set with a .000 hitting percentage.

But VU cruised from there, hitting a combined .333 over the final three sets to neutralize the Penguins (3-16, 2-11 PacWest).

For the sixth straight match, junior Adeline Galvanoni led the Blue and Gold offensively as she finished with 12 kills on .435 (12-2-23) hitting efficiency.

Senior Alister Borabo added 11 kills, while Morgan Cole and Delaney Hill chipped in eight apiece. 

Blair Dodge recorded her 12th career match with 20 or more digs, collecting a match-high 21 to lead the Lion back row. Cole scooped up 14 digs of her own.

The setter tandem of Rachel Lim and Madeline DeLucia handed out 21 and 19 assists, respectively. Lim added 11 digs to secure a double-double.

In addition to hitting .385 (5-0-13), middle blocker Kayla Robinson led the VU defensive effort at the net with four block assists.

VU led in every statistical category, including kills (51-39), assists (47-33), hitting percentage (.231-.094), aces (7-5), digs (68-62) and total blocks (6.0-3.0).

Reagan Macha led the Penguins with 15 kills.

"Overall a great team effort today with a few highlights," said Head Coach Jennifer Dorn. "Alister Borabo had 11 kills as she's been finding her stride again which was great to see, as well as Adeline Galvanoni with 12. Blair Dodge had 21 digs, but she's also been such a consistent passer and defender for us in the libero position as well as on the service line."

What Happened?

Set 1 - The Lions flailed away in the early going, falling behind 4-0 with a slew of attack errors.

VU had just one kill through the first 13 points as the Penguins raced out to a 10-3 lead. But VU refocused and landed a 6-0 run, punctuated by a double block from Robinson and Hill on Dominican's Ella Heckman.

Dominican cradled a one to two point lead for quite some time until Vanguard caught the visitors, taking an 18-17 lead on a Penguin attack error. Dominican responded by scoring four of the next five points to retake a 21-19 lead.

The Lions crept within 22-21 on a Bailey Olbur putaway, but Dominican closed the set with three straight points to grab the 25-21 win. 

Dominican hit .143 in the first set.

Set 2 - VU returned the favor to start set two in breaking out to a 4-0 advantage.

Galvanoni got going as she accounted for four of VU's first five points, getting three kills and combining with Robinson on a stuff of Ashlyn Daugherty.

The Penguins briefly waddled alongside the Lions, trailing just 6-5, but the home side eventually created distance. VU opened up a 14-9 lead on a Lim ace, and a 4-0 run later in the set gave the Lions a comfortable 19-12 advantage.

The run eventually bulged to 8-1 as VU led 23-13, and a DeLucia kill and Dominican attack error closed out the set in favor of VU, 25-14.

VU's hitting improved dramatically to .333 (13-2-33) in set two.

Set 3 – A pivotal set as the two teams fought through 10 ties before declaring a winner.

VU utilized a 4-0 run to open up a 10-6 lead as back-to-back Olbur kills created momentum. But the Penguins stole the momentum back, reeling off five consecutive points to take an 11-10 edge. The final two points of that run came on aces from setter Camille Rivers.

The two teams traded points until VU posted another patented 4-0 run to go up 17-15. Dominican recorded the following point to pull within one, but that was as close as the visitors would get. VU put down another three straight points to widen its lead to 20-16, and maintained the four-point distance until 23-19.

VU's final two points came courtesy of a Penguin service error and a Galvanoni kill, her fourth of the set. VU seized the 25-20 victory after hitting .275, compared to .125 efficiency for the Penguins.

Set 4 – For the third time in four sets, a team scored the first four points. 

The Lions took the honors to start set four – getting there via a Penguin service error, kills from Robinson and Galvanoni, and an Olbur ace.

The Penguins recovered and tied the score at 8-8 and 9-9. But the Lions answered with a crushing 7-0 run to take control. Cole had two of her kills during the run to restore order.

VU was never threatened from there, eventually building an eight-point lead at 20-12. With VU leading 20-13, the Lions scored the final five points to take the 25-13 victory.

VU hit a blistering .423 (14-3-26) to polish off the Penguins.

What Was Said?: "Today was a fun match," said Dorn. "We've had some challenging weeks back-to-back with a lot of travel so we were very happy to be back home in our gym! We're still working on coming out of the gates tough, but our team is good at responding, so it was fun to see our response in set two."

What's Next?: The Lions host CUI on Thursday, November 7 at 7:00 p.m. in the Freed Center.