The Falcon volleyball team played like two different teams this weekend.
After playing really well Friday and sweeping Buffalo 25-18, 25-19, 27-25, the Falcons were unable to keep their winning ways Saturday as they were swept 25-20, 25-19, 25-21 by Akron.
‘We played really well on Friday night,’ said coach Denise Van De Walle. ‘We served Buffalo extremely tough and it threw off their offense. It was easy to play defense since they were out of system.
‘But the momentum didn’t carry over. We came out flat and that really never changed. We had the lead at times but we weren’t able to sustain it. It was really disappointing.’
After losing their first six Mid-American Conference games, the Falcons are now 3-2 in the last five MAC matches.
BG (10-17, 3-9 MAC) had no trouble in the first two sets against Buffalo. In the third set, however, Buffalo had a 24-21 lead. After a timeout, the Bulls got a kill to give them a 25-24 advantage.
A Noelle Spitler kill tied the game at 25, and then Corey Domek had a kill to end the game.
Spitler led the team with a career-high 12 kills, Shari Luther added 11 and Domek had eight.
Van De Walle was impressed with Spitler.
‘It was great to see Noelle step up and play big,’ she said. ‘She had a career night.’
Alex Zlabis had 19 digs in the match. Spitler had five blocks, while Emily Kauth added four.
The Zips came out strong on Saturday, hitting an impressive .325.
In each of the first two sets, the score was tied at 14 apiece, and then at one point, the Falcons led at 15-10 in the third set, but Akron finished off each set extremely hard.
‘Akron played us very well and we didn’t respond to their pressure,’ Van De Walle said. ‘They looked crisp and made very few errors on the night at all.
‘We couldn’t stop their outside hitters. Our blocking wasn’t as good as it can be and defensively we didn’t match up. I really thought they played exceptional.’
Kauth led BG with 12 kills and Domek and Spitler added nine each. Domek had 15 digs and Allison Kearney had 35 assists.
Overall, Van De Walle gives credit to everyone.
‘My entire staff was instrumental in the win,’ she said. ‘Mark [Hardaway], Rob [Frost], Tom [Teeters] and Dale [Hartzel] were very helpful from the bench. I credit them with a lot of what we were doing. It was a total team effort from top to bottom.”
