LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Volleyball was eliminated from the Mid-South Conference Tournament in the quarterfinal round Friday afternoon. The fifth-seeded Bears held leads in the opening two games but fourth-seeded St. Catharine would prevail in both of those games before moving into the semifinals with a 3-0 win (25-22, 25-19, 25-12).
St. Catharine just kept getting better and better on the attacking end as it hit for a higher percentage in each successive game. For the match, the Patriots hit .376 as a team. This included hitting percentages over .420 in each of the final two games.
In the opening game, the Bears and Patriots battled back-and-forth as the score was tied seven times. The final tie came with the Bears rolling off three straight points after a service error that was followed with kills from Kristi Humble and Christina Shelton. However, attack errors on the next two rallies would leave them trailing 21-19. The Bears got the score back to 22-21 but a Patriots' kill followed by a block would allow St. Catharine to trade side-outs as it claimed the opening game, 25-22.
The second game saw the Bears take an early advantage as Humble's kill putting her side up 3-2. Shawnee State would never surrender that lead all the way up until 13-all. The Bears' largest lead of the second game came at 7-3 following three straight kills from Paige Zelich. Holding a 12-9 edge, St. Catharine clawed its way back to 13-all. The Patriots would keep that momentum as they took the next two points and seven of the next nine to go up 20-15. With the largest lead of the match by either side at that time, St. Catharine went up 2-0 by claiming five of the last nine points as it hit .429 overall for the game.
The third and final game was the only game in the entire match in which the Bears did not hold a lead at any point. St. Catharine started by reeling off six straight points and Shawnee State just simply could not recover from the early deficit. The blistering hitting from St. Catharine just would not let up is at finished with a .438 hitting percentage – its highest of any game – to clinch the win in straight games.
Casey Stone led the Patriots with 13 kills during the match while Rebecca Just, Catharine Hall and Allie Southard each finished with 10 kills to give the Patriots four different players with double figure kill totals. Abbey Sorrells finished the match with 43 assists.
For the Bears, a day after being named first-team All-MSC, Zelich led her squad with 11 kills for the match while Humble added seven more kills. Hannah Gephart finished her final collegiate match with a team-high 16 assists while Bonnie Huesing added 10 assists.
Carly Mazza, who was named a second-team All-MSC performer yesterday, came up with a team-high 23 digs. The Bears recorded just five blocks in the match, including three solo efforts.
With the loss, the Bears finish the 2013 season with an overall record of 17-15. The winning record marks the fifth time in the past six seasons that the Bears have finished with a winning record.
