Chippewas Close Out Falcons In Four Sets

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Mt. Pleasant, Mich. – After spending each of the past two weeks at home in the Stroh Center, the Bowling Green State University volleyball team returned to the road Thursday night and continued to struggled to close out opponents in a visiting arena. The Falcons had opportunities throughout but dropped a four-set match to Central Michigan 25-23, 25-22, 19-25, 25-18 in Mid-American Conference action.

With a young team consisting of just two seniors and no juniors, the Falcons are still learning how to close out sets on the road. And Thursday night, that issues became a factor. Central Michigan scored the final five points in a 25-23 first-set win and held off a late charge in the second. The Chippewas put the match away with an 8-1 run to close the fourth after the score was tied at 17-17.

"This was a disappointing loss for us because we did not play up to our potential," BGSU head coach Danijela Tomic said. "We had a good game plan that was only executed in the one set we won. We have to get contributions from everyone on the court and unfortunately that did not happen tonight."

In the opening set, BGSU used an 8-2 run after trailing 17-14 to go ahead 22-19. After splitting the next two points, Bowling Green still led 23-20 but Central Michigan quickly answered with three in a row to tie the score. Head coach Danijela Tomic used a timeout to settle the team but CMU came out of the break with a block and a kill to earn the opening set.

Central Michigan led by as many as five points in the second set, but Bowling Green rallied to get within one at 21-20 following a block from Nicole Slimko and Alyssa Maloney. CMU again found ways to win the clutch points, scoring the next three on a pair of kills and a service ace, and held on for the 25-22 victory.

After the intermission break, a refocused Bowling Green squad pulled away early in the third. The Falcons doubled up CMU 12-6 during the first half of the set and the Chippewas never got back on even footing as BGSU cruised to a relatively easy 25-19 victory to extend the match.

Central Michigan jumped out to a five-point lead in the fourth but the Falcons battled with a 6-1 run. In a four-point stretch during that comeback, Maloney had two kills and an ace to even the score at 15-15. CMU scored the next two points but Kelsey Bates and Erica Fullenkamp posted back-to-back kills to tie the score at 17-17. The Chippewas, though, put the match away by scoring the next six points and closing on an 8-1 run for the 25-18 victory.

Bowling Green hit .213 for the match – the team's highest attack percentage in a loss this year. Maloney led the way with 15 kills, just one shy of her career high, and she attacked at a .448 clip. Freshman Paige O'Connor added 10 kills and a .500 attack percentage. Slimko and Maloney had two aces each and Maloney and Bates each had five blocks. Madeline Garda added 19 digs, her sixth consecutive match with at least 15.

While the Falcons hit at a clip that has been good enough this year to earn the victory, BGSU was hurt by allowing Central Michigan to hit .245. As well, the Chippewas had a 57-50 edge in digs and 8-5 advantage in service aces. BGSU did post 10.0 blocks, four more than CMU.

With the win, Central Michigan improves to 8-11 overall and 3-4 in conference action. Bowling Green falls to 4-15 overall and 1-6 in the MAC. The Falcons will play at Eastern Michigan Saturday at 7 pm looking to rebound.

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Alyssa Maloney

Paige O'Connor

Jelena Sunjic

Kelsey Bates

Players Mentioned

Kelsey Bates

Erica Fullenkamp

Madeline Garda

Alyssa Maloney

Paige O'Connor

Nicole Slimko

Players Mentioned

Kelsey Bates

Erica Fullenkamp

Madeline Garda

Alyssa Maloney

Paige O'Connor

Nicole Slimko

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