CLARION, Pa. – The Slippery Rock University volleyball team was narrowly defeated in five sets (25-17, 24-26, 25-15, 21-25, 15-10) by Clarion University Friday night at Tippin Gymnasium in Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference competition.
Saturday's match was the fourth five-set contest this season for both Slippery Rock (9-11, 1-6 PSAC) and Clarion (15-6, 6-2 PSAC).
Freshman
Stephanie Jacobsen recorded a career-high 12 kills in the loss for The Rock. Fellow rookie
Erinn Kahoe added nine kills as well as four block assists.
Shayla Ray also gave a stellar performance with eight kills on just 14 attempts with only one attack error for an impressive .500 attack percentage in addition to four block assists.
Brooke Bostwick paced SRU's defensive effort with five total blocks (one solo / four assisted) to go with four kills.
Kaley Fucci and
Kelsey Boyle rounded out The Rock's attack with five and four kills, respectively. Fucci also served two aces.
Setters
Zoe Rivet and
Haley Defibaugh each produced double-doubles against the Golden Eagles. Rivet passed out 25 assists and made 12 digs while also serving two aces and tallying three block assists. Defibaugh chipped in 11 assists and 16 digs.
Defensive specialist
Courtney Oberlander made a team-high 32 digs in what was her fourth contest of the season with at least 30 digs.
The Rock and Golden Eagles played to a 10-10 tie to begin the opening set before Clarion took control of the opener with a 11-4 run to open up a 21-14 lead on the way to a 25-17 victory.
SRU once again found itself tied at 10-10 with Clarion in second set and CU once again was able to to go on a 9-4 run to push its lead out to 19-14. However, The Rock responded with an 8-1 spurt of its own to take the lead at 22-20. Ray had three kills and one block over the run. Clarion did manage to claw back into the set and even the game at 24-24, but SRU withstood the charge and recorded back-to-back points thanks to a solo block by Bostwick then a matching kill from the senior middle hitter.
Following a 25-15 Clarion win in the third set, the two evenly-matched teams traded points for nearly the entirety of the fourth set as The Rock and Golden Eagles found themselves knotted at 18-18 with neither team ready to flinch. SRU would nudge its way to a two-point lead off of a Clarion attack error and a Jacobsen kill to force a Golden Eagle timeout with The Rock leading 20-18.
The timeout did little to stop The Rock's momentum as SRU came out of the break to score five the set's final eight points thanks to three Clarion attack errors and a pair of blocks to earn a 25-21 victory and force a fifth set. The duos of Ray / Jacobsen and Kahoe / Fucci combined on the back-to-back set-closing blocks.
However, Slippery Rock was unable to carry over its strong finish in the fourth set to fifth as Clarion jumped out to an 8-3 lead and never looked back en route to the match-clinching 15-10 win.
The Golden Eagles were led by the duo of Julia Holden and Taylor Braunagel. Holden had 21 kills with Braunagel close behind at 19.
For the match, Clarion held advantages in both hitting percentage (.153-.087) and aces (8-4) while SRU edged the Golden Eagles in blocks (10-9). Slippery Rock has now registered at least 10 blocks in a match on five occasions in 2017.
Slippery Rock will look to bounce back from Friday's loss with a win 1 p.m. Saturday at Indiana (Pa.).
To stay up to date with all that happens at The Rock, follow our official athletic communication accounts on Twitter (@Rock_Athletics), Facebook (RockAthletics), Instagram (RockAthletics) and Snapchat (@RockAthletics).
