CMS Volleyball Remains Perfect, Sweeps Cal Lutheran in Three

CLAREMONT, Calif. - The top-ranked Claremont-Mudd-Scripps volleyball team started slow and had to dig out of a 17-11 hole in the first set, but controlled the match the rest of the way as it earned a 25-22, 25-10, 25-18 win over Cal Lutheran on Friday evening in a battle of the top two teams in the SCIAC standings at Roberts Pavilion.

Kelsey Polhemus had a season-high 11 kills in 14 attempts to lead the way for the Athenas, who improve to 20-0 on the year and 10-0 in the SCIAC. Cal Lutheran slips to 10-8 overall and 6-2 in the league, which gives CMS an almost insurmountable lead for the top seed in the SCIAC Tournament, holding a two-game lead and the tiebreaker with six games to play. 

Brenna Bell continued her torrid season with 10 kills in 15 attempts, hitting .533 to improve her hitting percentage on the year from .421 to .428. She came in ranked fourth in the nation in hitting percentage, and first among outside hitters, and closed the gap on overall national leader Lauren Bissette, a middle hitter at Meredith College currently hitting at .441. 

Bell helped CMS finish off the first set with back-to-back kills with the score 23-22. It looked for a while like the Athenas might suffer their first set loss of the conference season, as they fell behind 17-11 before calling a timeout to regroup. Polhemus came out of the timeout with a kill, and Spencer Hagenbuch had an ace to cap a 3-0 run and make it 17-14. Cal Lutheran stopped that mini-run with a block to make it 18-14, but CMS rattled off the next six points in a row to surge in front. 

Polhemus started the 6-0 run with a kill, and two straight kills from Summer Ellis brought the Athenas within a point. A block from Izzy Sakoda and Polhemus tied it, and then Sakoda had the go-ahead kill, followed by a Jenna Holmes ace that hit the tape and fell over. The teams exchanged points down the stretch, and a Cal Lutheran block made it 23-22, before Bell struck twice in a row to end the set. 

CMS left little to chance in the second set, using an 11-1 run to turn a 5-4 lead into a 16-5 advantage, including seven straight points after the Regals cut it to 9-5. After a Cal Lutheran error made it 10-5, Sakoda had two straight kills, and Polhemus had three in a row, before Holmes capped off the run with a kill, sending CMS on its way to a commanding 25-10 win. 

The Regals hung tougher in the third set, keeping the score with 16-15, before CMS had a pivotal 5-0 run to take a six-point lead. Dani Beder started the run with a kill, and contributed a block in the middle, while Georgia McGovern had an ace, and Bell had a kill off an overpass to make it 21-15. Cal Lutheran had a kill to close to within 23-18, but Bell followed with her tenth kill and Hagenbuch capped off the match with an ace. 

Holmes was also in double figures in kills for CMS with 10 in 20 attempts. McGovern (19) and Hagenbuch (17) combined for 36 assists while Hagenbuch added three service aces. Dede Carranza led the defense with 12 digs. CMS hit .356 for the match, improving its nation-leading hitting percentage to .323, almost 40 points higher than second-place Northwestern (.286), including 20 kills in 31 attempts in the third set alone.

CMS will be back in action on Tuesday when it travels to Chapman for a 7 p.m. contest.