It was Mexico’s 25 unforced errors (against 14 from Dominican Republic) that helped their opponents the most during the match and even the game winning point that came on a mistaken serve exemplified that. The Caribbean Queens also outplayed their rivals in attack with 42 successful swings against 32, and in blocking with six kill blocks against three. Outside hitter and captain Brayelin Martinez authored three of those kill blocks, fired an ace and spiked at a 69% success rate to contribute a match-high 22 points to the Dominican win. Her cross-court teammate Yonkaira Pena added another 11 points, all in swings.
“We are very happy about qualifying. To make it to the second round was an important goal. Now we have to prepare for the next goal, which is to finish first in the pool,” Dominican Republic’s Brazilian head coach Marcos Kwiek told VBTV. “We prepared very well for this game. The third set was the hardest we had, but we know Mexico, we’ve been playing them for a while, so we managed to neutralize them and we are just happy we did a good job.”
The third set was the only one, in which Mexico maintained a lead in the score for a while. Serving was the only scoring element, in which the North Americans slightly outplayed their NORCECA rivals in this match, by 3-2 in aces. Opposite Sofia Maldonado was their best scorer of the game with 13 points, all in attack.
