The St. Catherine University volleyball team had a tough draw to start the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) season in facing three playoff teams from a year ago. Despite battling each team in very close sets, the Wildcats couldn't find a way to pull off a win. Finally, the Wildcats' were rewarded for their hardwork and scrappy play when they defeated Carleton College 3-1 (25-19, 26-24, 19-25, 25-21) for their first MIAC win of 2015, Wednesday evening in Northfield, Minnesota.
"We played well tonight," said Head Coach
Corey Phelps. "We showed great resilience when we were down in the second and fourth sets to come back and win. Our serving and passing were keys (to the win) and we did a great job stopping their big hitters when we needed to. This was a good first conference win. (We'll be) back to work tomorrow to prepare for Friday."
In the opening set, the Wildcats jumped out to a huge 9-1 lead before looking as if they might pull away with an easy win up 19-10. The Knights managed to rattle off five points in a row to pull within four. The Wildcats weren't going to allow the Knights to take the win, though, and finished the first set with a 6-1 run.
The second set began in similar fashion to the first, but this time in favor of the Knights. Down 5-1 early, the Wildcats then returned the favor going on a 5-1 run to even the score at 6-6. Both teams exchanged leads throughout the set until the Wildcats finally managed to string together a few consecutive points to take a 2-0 lead.
The Wildcats jumped out to a commanding lead early in the first set with a 9-3 lead, but watched their lead slip away as the Knights mounted pressure to tie the match at 14-14. The Knights held a slight lead for the next handful of points before cutting the Wildcat lead to just 2-1.
In the decisive fourth set, the Wildcats took a commanding lead early and found themselves in cruise mode leading 12-6. That was, until, Carleton went on a 9-0 run to take a two-point lead at 15-13. The two teams battled back and forth to 19-19 before the Wildcats closed out their first conference victory with a 6-2 run at the end of the match.
Sabrina Astar (Hastings, Minn./Hastings) and
Alyssa Besch (Apple Valley, Minn./Eastview) led the Wildcats both offensively and on a huge night blocking for the team. Both players led with a team-high nine kills each and assisted on four of the team's eight blocks. Astar hit .261, while Besch was also impressive hitting .250 and adding three digs and an assist.
Amber Zeiher (Le Sueur, Minn./Le Sueur-Henderson) was a huge factor in the victory recording seven kills and assisting on four blocks. She also hit .250 with just one error on the night. Mackenzie Peper (Osceola, Wis./Osceola) also had a strong night contributing seven kills with just two errors. Megan Lindenfelser (Nowthen, Minn./Anoka) recorded five kills, but was a much bigger weapon defensively with 19 digs and two block assists.
Payton Baker (Forest Lake, Minn./Forest Lake) also made contributions all around with four kills, three block assists and four assists.
Shanee Herd (Alexandria, Minn./Jefferson) continued to anchor the Wildcat defense and play at a top level. The junior libero dug up a match-high 26 digs for her 11th 20-dig performance of the season.
Maria Davis (West St. Paul, Minn./St. Agnes) and
Hayley Levenhagen (Pewaukee, Wis./Catholic Memorial) again set up the Wildcat offense and contirbuted all three of the Wildcats service aces on the evening. Davis recorded a double-double with 16 assists and 10 digs, while Levenhagen had 13 assists, four digs and two aces.
With the win, the Wildcats match their win total from a year ago improving to 10-5 on the season and 1-3 in the MIAC. They are scheduled for another road conference match Friday against Bethel University at 7 p.m. in Arden Hills, Minnesota.
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