No. 23 Heidelberg stuns No. 4 Volleyball in five sets after being down 2-0

Renee Berry

By Steven Wright

| Box Score |

TIFFIN --Four Polar Bears had double-digit kills and five had double-digit digs, but No. 23 Heidelberg stunned the No. 4-ranked Ohio Northern volleyball team in five sets after being down 2-0 Tuesday evening Seiberling Gymnasium.

Northern drops to 19-2 overall and 1-1 in the Ohio Athletic Conference, while the Student Princes improve to 18-4, 4-0.

The best Polar Bear performance on the night belonged to senior Renee Berry who had 12 kills, a .455 hitting percentage and 20 digs.

She also tied a career high with seven assists.

Senior Liz Schnelle had 15 kills for the Polar Bear offense, while juniors Abby Schaller and Alex Christian each turned in 12-kill performances.

Freshman setter Kelsie Zumberger had a double-double, along with Berry, with 41 assists and 11 digs on the evening.

Sophomore libero Kasey Roeser had 26 digs on the night, while sophomore Nicole Howard (season high) and senior Liz Decima had 12 and 11 digs, respectively.

As a team, Ohio Northern had season-bests of 100 digs 61 kills and 53 assists.

ONU easily won Set 1 and 2 without much resistance from HU 25-10 and 25-18.

After taking a 10-minute intermission between the second and third sets, Heidelberg returned to the court rejuvenated and won Sets 3 and 4 by identical scores of 25-22.

Ohio Northern forced Heidelberg to take the first timeout of the decisive set by taking a 7-4 advantage.

Although the Polar Bears maintained the lead at the switch 8-6, the Student Princes gained momentum and tied the score at 9-9, forcing ONU to take a timeout.

ONU then had leads of 12-10 and 13-12 but would never lead again, as HU scored two straight points at 14-13.

Schnelle would get a kill to knot the score at 14-14, but Heidelberg scored the final two points of the contest to take the set and the match.

The win extends Heidelberg's home winning streak to 20 matches, with its last loss being to ONU in 2006.

This also marks the second time in history that HU has defeated ONU. The last Student Prince victory over the Polar Bears happened in 1986.

Heidelberg's Venessa Haase was spectacular through the final three sets and was the most aggressive player on the court in Set 5.

Haase finished with a match-high 17 kills, 16 digs and a .325 hitting percentage.

Jackie Reinhart and Amanda Atchison both tallied 11 kills for the Student Princes.

Ohio Northern will return to action on Friday at 7 pm when it travels to Marietta to continue OAC play.