Wednesday evening, Bowling Green Volleyball closed out the regular season with a win over the Miami RedHawks in straight sets. The win moved the Falcons to an 11-7 conference record.
Here’s a look at how it happened.
Set 1: 25-15
Although getting a rocky start with a few Falcon service errors, Bowling Green was able to recover and establish a 6-2 lead and force Miami’s first timeout.
Coming out of the early timeout, the Falcons gained control of the ball, leading to five Alex Laboy aces in a row, her career high. With this jump start, the Orange and Brown were up with a commanding 11-2 lead over the RedHawks.
Focusing and gaining some momentum, the RedHawks put together a 7-1 stretch, mostly attributed to Falcon service errors. Forging on, Miami worked to close the gap, but after one full BG serving rotation, the Falcons found their rhythm again.
Reaching the 20 point mark, the Falcons fought to the end and took the set 25-15.
Leading the Falcons were Laboy with those five aces and Lauryn Hovey with eight kills.
Set 2: 25-14
Jumping into the second set, the Falcons were able to grab an early 7-2 lead over Miami, with only three points coming from kills or aces. Soon enough, the set developed into a 12-6 lead for Bowling Green, forcing a Redhawk timeout.
The lead extended to 17-7 until Miami gave in to call for their final timeout of the set.
In the home stretch of the set, Miami gained back some ground, logging a 4-1 stretch and forcing Bowling Green’s first timeout of the evening.
Just a few points short of taking the set, Bowling Green held a 22-14 lead over the RedHawks, and soon enough the second set would go to the Falcons.
Silencing the RedHawks to only a .057 hitting percentage, the Falcons actually had seven less attacks attempts during this set.
Set 3: 25-13
Putting together their cleanest set of the night, the Falcons quickly grabbed an 8-3 lead with five kills and two aces, one by Hovey and one by Jaden Walz.
Though Miami found a way to close the gap to a 10-6 score, back-to-back blocks by freshman Helen Wilford fought off the RedHawks offense. After a powerful kill by Lauryn Hovey, gameplay was interrupted by a break, leaving the Falcons on top with a 15-9 lead.
Following the break, Hovey kept the ace count rolling to nine behind the service line, forcing a Miami timeout. Reaching the 20 point mark, Lindsey LaPinta joined the ace club as well, leading to a grand total of ten.
Calling for their final timeout of the evening, the RedHawks fell behind as Bowling Green took a 24-13 lead.
With a final kill by Kat Mandly, the Falcons took care of sweeping Miami in straight sets to close out their regular season.
Laboy graced the stat sheet in a couple spots this evening, most notably, leading the night with half of the teams aces with five. In addition, Laboy also led the night with 15 digs for the Falcons.
Leading the offensive charge for the Falcons was not surprisingly Hovey, who finished with 16 kills and 19 points overall.
Walz, with 21 assists and 11 digs, earned her tenth double-double of the season.
Speaking on the upcoming MAC tournament, senior Hannah Best talked about the excitement within the team about this upcoming weekend.
“We’re really excited, I think what’s special about this year is that it’s been a difficult year. It hasn’t been as smooth sailing as previous years have been. So for us, we’ve been embracing everything that comes our way and approaching it with grace. We’re doing that together and I’m excited to see what we do in the tournament.”
From here, the Falcons travel to Kalamazoo for the 2023 MAC Tournament this weekend, facing Ball State in the quarterfinals on Saturday, November 18, with first serve at 6:30 p.m. Catch all the action on 88.1 FM WBGU, as Steve Iwanek has the call from Kalamazoo.
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