Istanbul, Turkey, February 13, 2014. The home heroines of Besiktas ISTANBUL beat Rocheville LE CANNET in straight sets to prompt a golden set, which they also won to move on to the semifinals of the 2014 CEV Volleyball Challenge Cup - Women. The Turkish team took 70 minutes to hammer out its 3:0 (25-20, 25-14, 25-20) victory, thus, cancelling out its straight-set loss from the first leg in France and, then, another 13 minutes to win the golden set by 15-8.
Besiktas’ Marina Tumas and Paula Yamila Nizetich were the four sets’ overall best scorers with 15 and 14 points respectively, while Alexandra Jupiter tallied up 12 for the French team.
The match started with Besiktas taking an advantage of 5-2 and they moved up to 8-4 at the first technical time-out. Besiktas kept its good game and found itself leading by 16-10 at the second technical time-out. After 20-11, gave away some of its advantage, but still managed to close it off at 25-20.
The Turkish side carried on and gained a 4-1 early lead in the second set. Although Rocheville tied the score at 7-7, with some good serving from Myriam Kloster, Besiktas went up again. After 11-11, the team from Istanbul made a 7-point run for 18-11 and the continued to widen the gap with some great spiking by Gabriela Koeva for the final 25-14 in the second set.
Rocheville had a good start of the third set by managing a 4-1 early lead. Besiktas tied at 4-4 thanks to Natalia Hanikoglu’s good serves and Dicle Nur Babat’s successful spikes. However, the French squad yet again jumped forward to a 9-6 lead. Besiktas narrowed the gap down to one point, but the French fought on to a 17-12 lead. Besiktas scored four points in a row and set itself for the final push. With perfect performance by Paula Yamila Nizetich from the serving line, another eight consecutive points followed and at 24-18 the home heroines were already thinking about the golden set.
In the decisive play the two sides traded runs to tie it at 6-6 and Besiktas was 8-6 ahead at the side switch. The Turkish side extended its lead to 13-7 and won the golden set by 15-8, celebrating their spot in the semifinals.
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