No. 11 Volleyball defeats host Titans to open Illinois Wesleyan Invitational
By Wes Mayberry
| Illinois Wesleyan Invitational page | ONU 2021 Tournaments page |
Bloomington, Ill. — The No. 11 Ohio Northern volleyball team opened its three-game Illinois Wesleyan Invitational schedule with a bang on Friday, defeating the host Titans 27-25, 19-25, 25-21, 22-25, 15-12 at the Shirk Center.
The victory improved the Polar Bears to 6-0 on the season while dropping Illinois Wesleyan to 4-3.
ONU got a game-high 17 kills from senior Melina Woods (Ada), who was followed closely behind by freshman Taylor Baxter (Bellevue) with 16. Baxter also tallied a game-high six blocks.
Woods hit .357 for the match while Baxter hit .325 and sophomore Sydney Eggleton (Southfield, Mich./Farmington) hit .308. The Polar Bears hit .236 as a team while the Titans hit .183.
Senior Hannah Irmer (Indianapolis, Ind./Roncalli) added a game-high 28 digs to go with a match-high 53 assists from senior Kiki Carle (Cincinnati/Mother of Mercy).
Courtney McAuliffe tallied a team-high 15 kills for Illinois Wesleyan to go with 19 digs from Amber Juarez, 29 assists from Madi Corey and five service aces from Grace Sanders.
ONU opened with a 27-25 victory in a tightly contested first set. With the score tied at 25-all, the Polar Bears took the lead on a kill from Baxter and proceeded to win the set courtesy of an Illinois Wesleyan attack error.
The Polar Bears went up 4-2 to start the second set but faltered down the stretch, as the Titans closed on an 8-2 run for the 25-19 victory that tied the match at one set apiece.
Northern responded with a 25-21 win in the third set, closing out the victory with a kill from Woods.
The Titans' 25-22 win in the fourth set forced the match to go to the tiebreaking fifth set, and as they did two days prior at Ohio Wesleyan, the Polar Bears played well with the game in the balance.
ONU opened the fifth set by taking a 5-1 lead with the help of kills from Woods and freshman Emma Strozewski (Lakeville, Minn./North) and two from Baxter, forcing a Titan timeout.
Illinois Wesleyan fought back to tie the score at 6-all before Northern rallied for a 10-7 edge and forced IWU into another timeout.
The Titans got back to within 12-10 going into an ONU timeout, but the Polar Bears proceeded to close out the match by scoring three of the final five points to secure the victory.
Northern's final two points came off of a kill from Baxter and an ace from freshman Rachel Jennings (Novi, Mich.).
The Polar Bears return to the court Saturday to close out their Illinois Wesleyan Invitational schedule with matches against Rose-Hulman (Ind.) at 11 a.m. and Monmouth (Ill.) at 1 p.m.