CMS Volleyball Bounces Back from First Defeat With Dominant Win Over No. 14 Ohio Northern

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - The second-ranked Claremont-Mudd-Scripps volleyball team bounced back from its first defeat of the 2021 season in fine fashion, rolling to a quick 25-20, 25-13, 25-18 win over No. 14 Ohio Northern on the final day of the Midwest Classic, hosted by Calvin University.

The Athenas improve to 22-1 on the year with the win, bouncing back from their first defeat last night in a 3-1 defeat to host Calvin, ranked No. 6 in the country, two hours after defeating No. 4 Hope 3-1. 

Junior setter Spencer Hagenbuch earned a spot on the All-Tournament team for CMS, after tallying 19 assists and eight digs in the Ohio Northern win. Dede Carranza was big defensively again for the Athenas as well with 26 digs, while Melanie Williams had 11 kils and Jenna Holmes added 10 offensively, and Kelsey Polhemus had seven kills in 11 attempts. 

The key stretch of the match came late in the first set, as CMS was down 20-19, but closed on a 6-0 run to take a 1-0 set lead, and the Athenas never gave up the momentum the rest of the way. Jackie Jones tied it 20-20 with a kill, and then combined with Polhemus on a block. After an attack error from Ohio Northern, Jones had another kill, Georgia McGovern had an ace, and Polhemus and Williams combined on the set-winning block. 

The second set saw CMS up 10-7 before a 5-0 lead gave it full control. Polhemus had a kill, and then combined on two straight blocks with Brenna Bell during the run. Jones and Audrey Sawyer combined on a block to make it 23-13, Holmes had an ace and an attack error gave the Athenas the 2-0 lead. 

Ohio Northern led 10-8 early in the third before another 5-0 run from CMS swung the set, With Polhemus and Jones having kills and McGovern adding another ace. The lead was just 15-14 before Holmes had two kills in a 3-0 run to stretch it to four, and Isabel Yau-Weeks finished off the 25-18 set, and 3-0 win, with an ace. 

CMS will be back in action on Tuesday against Chapman, before its regular season home finale on Friday night against Pomona-Pitzer at 7 p.m.