With a 3-0 victory Tuesday over Oakland the volleyball team is off to a 7-1 start, their best start since 1991 when they went on to win the MAC and saw action in the NCAA tournament.
“It was a typical match against a team that wasn’t as good as we were,” said head coach Denise Van De Walle. “We played down a little bit to their level.”
The fact that the Falcons were not playing their best, was only apparent in the first game.
“We had a slow start, but we recovered from that to win the first game 30-27,” Van De Walle said.
The Falcons won the next two games 30-24 and 30-20. “[Oakland] was a little bit better than I had thought they would be,” Van De Walle said. “They had more aggressive hitters than I thought they might bring to the table and their setters did a nice job.”
Sophomore blocker Sara Sikorski said, “Oakland isn’t the strongest team on our playing schedule, but they played well against us.”
“I was really pleased that we were able to play everyone and do well enough to win,” Van De Walle said. “The biggest surprise to me was our blocking because prior to the match I told the team I wasn’t sure how effective of an offense they would run against us.”
The Grizzlies had 39 kills and hit .130, while BG had 48 kills and hit .252 as a team.
The Falcons blocked a total of 18 balls in the match, which averages out to six blocks a game.
“Six a game is unheard of,” Van De Walle said. “Our goal is to block three a game and we blocked six a game, which is rare to have something like that happen.”
Senior Caty Rommeck had a total of 10 blocks, two of which were solo blocks. She also led the team with 10 kills and eight digs.
“A lot of girls on the team who usually don’t see playing time got to play,” Sikorski said.
Sikorski played in place of senior Natalie Becker who jammed her thumbs in the match against Western Michigan last weekend. She had several career highs including five kills, two service aces, a solo block, five total blocks. She also led the team with 38 assists. “I was lucky to see some playing time this season,” Sikorski said. “I tried to do the best I could when our setter was hurt.”
Van De Walle allowed sophomore Nadia Bedricky to play right side across the front in two games instead of her usual position as defensive specialist. Bedricky had six kills, no errors and eight attempts.
“Nadia and Bridget both had a good game,” Sikorski said.
Redshirt freshman Bridget Protas played for Kristin Gamby in games two and three. She had five kills, no errors and nine attempts along with a solo block and three block assists.
“We had Sara, Bridget and Nadia on the floor at the same time and they are all from that area [Oakland],” Van De Walle said. “It was their hometown area so they had a lot of fans there. The same thing with Caty and Shyann. They transferred from Oakland to Bowling Green, so they had a lot of fans there.”
