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Late in the third set, Long Beach State junior Naomi Washington glided to her right, cranked back her right arm—like an old school pitching machine—and palmed a fastball back at a Cal State Northridge player. In self-defense, the Matador put her hands up only to see the ball sail out of bounds. It reminded me of the Mortal Kombat<\/i><\/span> video game, when you beat your opponent and got to “finish him” by dropping a fatality move. Washington’s kill—figuratively speaking—finished off the 3-0 (25-18, 25-21, 25-21) win for the ‘Niners. <\/span><\/p>\n The victory comes ten days after the last game for Long Beach State (12-3, 2-1), who displayed their versatility and depth against a pedestrian Northridge squad (5-13, 0-5). Caitlin Ledoux led the ‘Niners with ten kills on the night while Washington added eight and had a .375 hit percentage. Senior Nicole Vargas had a double-double with 29 assists and 10 digs for ‘Niners. <\/span><\/p>\n Northridge did hang tough throughout the match—especially in a first set that saw 13 ties before the ‘Niners went on a 8-1 run to close the set out. <\/span><\/p>\n Long Beach State stayed hot in the second set, hitting .359 as a team before taking the third set in large part due to a solid defensive performance led by the front line of Washington, Quincy Verdin, Brittney Herzog and even the 5’8” Vargas, who got in the mix with a memorable block of her own. Head Coach Brian Gimmillaro said he liked the defensive performance of his squad, which finished with 14 blocks in the match (Northridge only had 3).<\/span><\/p>\n Long Beach State faithful might have noticed two faces that haven’t seen too much paying time in previous matches in Herzog (four kills) and Nicole Moore (four kills). <\/span>Coach Gimmillaro sent out a myriad of different rotations to the floor, just to put it into the back of future opponents’ minds that this team is deep and can play different styles of volleyball. <\/span>“Friday we play [no. 22 Cal Poly] and we gave them a lot more things to look at—you know what I mean,” Coach Gimmillaro said after the win.<\/span><\/p>\n Yes, coach we know what you mean, “a lot” of different looks and lineups that would’ve needed a pitch count clicker to tally. In fact, Long Beach State played well in the last portion of the match with a smaller lineup consisting of Herzog, Ledoux, Vargas, Cat Highmark, Iris Murray and Lauren Minkel—before Washington came in and sent Northridge packing. <\/span><\/p>\n Like coach said, the ‘Niners will square up against the nationally ranked Mustangs Friday in a match-up of Big West heavyweights.<\/span><\/p>\n “The bigger the game, the more fun they are,” he said flashing that famous Gimmillaro smirk.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n