Oct. 21, 2008
Contact: Greg Murphy
CLEVELAND, Ohio - Cleveland State hosted its final nonconference match of the season on Tuesday night in Woodling Gym and dropped a five-set match to Bowling Green. Match scores were 25-16, 19-25, 16-25, 25-18, 15-8.
CSU fell to 4-16 overall, while the Falcons improved to 16-7.
Jenni Ramminger led three Vikings in double-digit kills with 12, while Amy Benz had 11 and Kayla Lefeld 10. Lefeld also added nine digs to just miss another double-double.
Jordan Goad handed out 43 assists to go along with six digs, while Maggie Bonomini (15) and Jordan Bateman (12) recorded double-digit digs. Bateman moved within 24 digs of breaking the CSU career record.
"We dug ourselves into a hole in the first set, but really responded and played some great volleyball in the second and third sets," head coach Chuck Voss said. "We were playing some outstanding defense and really started to get in a groove on offense.
"But we couldn't carry that over the the final two sets. We need to find a way to close out sets and matches and get mentally tougher as we get ready to play our final league matches of the season if we want to improve our standing."
BGSU hit .344 (14-3-32) in the opening set, while holding the Vikings to a .053 (10-8-38) attack percentage in racing out to a win in the first set. Corey Domek led the way with six kills in eight attempts.
However, CSU responed to win the next two sets, using six kills apiece from Lefeld and Benz and five from Ramminger.
CSU held a slim one-point lead (18-17) in the second set, but closed on a 7-2 run to seize momentum as the teams headed into the intermission. Five different players recorded kills during the run.
The Vikings fell behind in the third set, 10-7, but came all the way back to knot the set at 11-11. Trailing 13-12, the Vikings got a BGS attack error to even the set at 13-13 and proceeded to close the set on a 12-3 run to take a 2-1 lead. Bonomini and Bateman each served five straight CSU points in the set.
However, the Falcons came out firing in the fourth set taking a 7-3 lead on a Viking service error. Four straight CSU points evened the match at 7-7. The teams continued to exchange points as the set remained tied at 18-18 following a Domek kill. But the Falcons went on to score the final seven points of the set, forcing a deciding fifth set.
A Ramminger kill sliced the BGSU lead to 5-4 in the fifth set, but the Falcons scored the next four points to take a 9-4 lead and the Vikings could not get closer than four points the rest of the way.
Domek led BGSU with 16 kills, while Kendra Halm had 13 and Shari Luther 10. Sam Fish finished with 48 assists and seven digs, while Chelsey Meek tallied a match-best 21 digs.
The Falcons outhit the Vikings (.207-.172), finishing with more kills (57-53), assists (54-51), digs (61-56) and blocks (12-10). Both teams had four aces.
CSU continues its homestand when the Vikings host Wright State on Saturday, Oct. 25, beginning at 4:00 p.m. in Woodling Gym.
