The volleyball team volleyed back and forth throughout the night, and won the game in five sets against Miami University, getting career high numbers from multiple players.
Tied at two sets each, BG took a quick lead. After a timeout the Miami RedHawks came back to draw even at 14. Miami committed an error to aid the Falcons to their 10th five-set victory under coach Danijela Tomic.
“This was a great win,” Tomic said. “Miami is a tough team, they match up well with us. We won the first two and then they won the next two, and thank god we fished like we were able to.”
Tomic said this game showed resilience and she was proud of how her team responded when momentum shifted to the RedHawks.
“All the momentum was going to Miami after set two and they made it come back to us in the fifth,” she said.
Freshman Jelena Sunjic had a career high of 22 kills hit .320 on the night.
“She is a freshman and people need to realize this is her first year playing college volleyball,” Tomic said. “She stepped up big time. What else can you ask a freshman to do?”
Danielle Tonyan had a season high of 21 kills and helped fill the game of kill leader Lindsey Butterfield being out with a lower-body injury.
“I hit the ball as hard as I can and I know my teammates trust me to get the kill,” Tonyan said.
BG looked to get touches on the ball rather than blocks to “run down the ball.”
Jenny Ingle, the RedHawks kill leader, was held to 16 kills (four per set).
“Our coaches always tell us to hold our hands up as long as we can, and we will get the touches,” Sunjic said.”When we do that, we get blocks, we get touches, we can do whatever we want.”
Laura Avila played in place of Erica Fullenkamp. She had 56 assists on the night and 11 digs.
“She has done really great this weekend,” Sunjic said. “She stepped up tonight and took the job and did really great at [setting tonight].”
Alyssa Maloney had a career-high of nine blocks tonight and had five kills.
“This is another freshman who stepped up for us tonight,” Tomic said. “Alyssa is getting better and better; we have no issue of Alyssa working hard and tonight was a bit of a break through for her.”
With tonight’s win, the Falcons have tied Ohio University for first place in the Mid-American Conference East, but Tomic said she is not getting excited yet.
“We still have few matches to play,” Tomic said. “Ohio is still ahead of us. We will see what will happen after this weekend. We are still in the run for first place. There have been a ton of upsets, not just in our conference, but across the nation. We are taking this one match at a time.”
