COLUMBUS, Ohio - Looking to make it two straight road victories in a row, the SVSU volleyball team squared-off with the Ohio Dominican in a GLIAC cross-divisional matchup against the Panthers. After falling behind 1-0, the Cardinals rattled-off three consecutive sets to close out for a 3-1 victory.
The Panthers came out and grabbed the quick 1-0 lead with a 25-21 victory in the opening set. SVSU knotted the match at 1-1 after a 25-19 edge in the second set. The Cards continued the solid play in the third and fourth sets, sealing the match with scores of 25-22 and 25-21, respectively.
McKenzie Schuster marked a career-high with 15 kills, adding three blocks for SVSU, also marking a match-best in kills. Kaylee Schmitt added 11 kills and three blocks while hitting .333. Andrea Brigham added 13 kills, three blocks and 10 digs to the effort. Brooke Tiller anchored the Cardinal defense, racking-up 37 digs, earning Chili's "Player of the Match" plaudits. Tamara Heller had 20 digs as well as her seven kills on the offensive end. Morgan Eddy had a .389 hitting percentage while posting nine kills and five blocks. Kelly Vellucci had 38 assists and tied Eddy for the team-high five blocks.
"ODU played with some great intensity and effort, and we had to step up our game to try and match it," said head coach Will Stanton. "We had some very good, long rallies where neither team was going to back down and, fortunately, we were able to win many of those. Out attacking was not as strong against their big block today but our defense was huge with 106 total digs. Our blocking also got rolling pretty good in the fourth set."
The victory moves the Cards to 10-2 overall on the season and they even their 2015 GLIAC record to 2-2. The Panthers fall to 7-6 overall and own the same 2-2 league mark.
Saginaw Valley opens the home portion of the season on Tuesday, September 29th with a GLIAC matchup against Wayne State University. The Warriors will bring a 5-8 overall record and 1-3 GLIAC mark to Tuesday's contest at the Cardinal Gym.
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