The Earlham College volleyball team continued Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference competition with a 3-1 loss at Rose-Hulman on Wednesday evening.
The Quakers dropped to 12-15 (5-3 HCAC). Earlham currently holds the third seed in the conference standings, but needs a win on Saturday to host an opening-round tournament game next week.
Maria Young put up a big offensive number with 17 kills and a .255 hitting percentage. The junior southpaw had just five errors on 47 attempts in the contest. Setter Erin Wagner dished out 37 assists and scored two kills on quick attacks. Jen Shamel led the back line with 29 digs. Wagner also contributed defensively with 23 digs.
Both teams struggled to find accuracy in their attacks, with 40 total errors on the evening. The Quakers shot at a .171 hitting percentage in the four sets.
After trailing early in the opening set, Earlham scored a 3-0 run to tie the contest at 7-7.The Engineers then took the lead with a 4-0 run. With the Quakers trailing 16-15, Rose-Hulman scored a 6-2 run to lead 22-17. Earlham scored four straight points trying to catch up, but the Engineers turned a 3-0 run to win the set.
The teams stayed deadlocked in the second frame until a 5-1 run from the Quakers brought a 22-19 lead for Earlham. The Engineers rebounded with a 5-0 run that brought the home squad to set point. After the Quakers got a point from an attack error, the Engineers ended the set with a kill.
The Quakers jumped out to an 8-3 lead in the third frame before a 5-0 run from the Engineers. Earlham got back in the lead with a 5-1 run to make the score 13-9. The Quakers posted 13 kills and held Rose-Hulman to a .091 hitting percentage on the way to winning the frame.
The Engineer's offense hit its stride in set four with 15 kills and just one error. The home squad bounced out to an 18-9 lead before a 5-0 Earlham run. With the Quakers trailing 20-16, Rose scored three straight points to increase its lead to 23-16. After a kill from Young, The Engineers hit a kill to advance to match point. Aniyah Harrington scored the final kill for Earlham before Rose-Hulman ended the match on a kill to the back corner of play.
Earlham will conclude its regular season at Bluffton University on Saturday. The contest has been moved to a 7 pm start time to accommodate the Beaver soccer team hosting a conference tournament game in the afternoon. The Quakers could still take third place in the conference standings with a win on Saturday.
Original source can be found here.
Alerts Sign-up