Sports
Volleyball Gets Beat on Day Two in Kentucky
< < Back toAfter a nearly-perfect trip to Knoxville in the season's opening weekend, the Ohio volleyball team flipped the script for weekend number two. Unfortunately for Ryan Theis and his team, the script was fine the way it was.
Ohio beat Virginia Tech in five sets to start the Kentucky Classic in Lexington, but the University of Kentucky and Western Kentucky University ran the 'Cats ragged and sent Ohio back to .500.
The Bobcats were down two sets to one against Virginia Tech, and they trailed 14-13 in the fifth set but railed back to win the fifth 16-14.
Against Virginia Tech, freshmen Chelsea Bilger and Kelly Lamberti recorded 12 kills each, tying for the team lead. Katie Post had a career high tying 13 blocks while the Bobcats earned 21 blocks as a team. Mollie Geske and Kelly Colyar both topped the double-digit mark for digs with 17 and 16 respectively.
After losing the first set 25-16 to VT, Ohio bounced back to take the second set 25-23, despite being down 4-2 early on. Virginia Tech took the third set 25-15, but the Bobcats jumped out to an early 7-2 lead in the fourth to start their comeback. Ohio led 10-5, but VT scored eight of the next nine points to steal the lead from Ohio, 13-11. After a Lamberti kill and blocks by Post and Faith Robins, the Bobcats took the lead again, 18-17. Ohio had a two point lead at 20-18 after Post and Bailey Karst combined for a block, but the Hokies came back to even it up at 22. Errors by VT and the final kill by Bilger secured the win for Ohio to keep the match alive.
The fifth set saw many lead changes as well, but the Bobcats pushed to lead 15-14 after back-to-back kills by Bilger. MAC Defensive Player of the Week winner Lexie Hartnett killed the ball to secure the set and match win for the Bobcats, 16-14.
The Kentucky Classic continued on Saturday, but unfortunately for the Bobcats, their winning did not continue. Ohio suffered its second loss of the season after being swept by Kentucky on Saturday morning 20-25, 28-30, 14-25. The Bobcats hit only .036 as a team and the Wildcats had a 9-6 advantage in total team blocks.
On Saturday evening, the Bobcats took the court again against Western Kentucky (the Hilltoppers received votes in the latest AP poll) and despite the fact that Katie Post matched her season high 15 kills, Ohio lost to Western Kentucky in four sets 25-23, 15-25, 21-25, and 25-27.
Ohio took the first set after trailing 18-14, but after scoring the next 11 points and holding off WKU’s advances, the Bobcats came away with a win. Ohio was down early in the second set, but came back to even it up at 10. WKU scored ten of the next 12 points to help them win the second set. Ohio fell behind 2-1 after trailing through all of the third set. Despite an early lead, the Bobcats were down by seven in the fourth set. After a couple of kills by Kelly Lamberti and blocks by both Lamberti and Leah Petrovich, the score was even at 21. WKU pushed ahead in the end though and took the set to win the match 3-1.
The Bobcats were 1-2 for the weekend and stand at 3-3 after the first six games of the season. Post was named to the All-Tournament team after racking up 23 kills and 24 blocks over the weekend. Lamberti finished with 33 kills for the weekend. Ohio hosts the Baymont Invitational this weekend and welcome Louisville, Marshall, and Virginia.