No. 4 Volleyball sweeps Defiance to remain undefeated on the season
Submitted by s-wright.3 on Tue, 09/08/2009 - 6:36pm.
Kelly Smerekanich
By Steven Wright
| Box Score |
ADA - The No. 4-ranked Ohio Northern volleyball team remained undefeated by sweeping Defiance in three sets 25-9, 25-17, 25-23 Tuesday evening at the ONU Sports Center.
The Polar Bears improve to a perfect 5-0 on the season, while the Yellow Jackets dip below .500 at 2-3.
Northern hit .333 on the night with 39 kills, only eight errors and 93 attempts. The Polar Bear defense stymied the Yellow Jackets and held them to a .093 hitting percentage.
In Set 3, junior Kelly Smerekanich and senior Sharon Guzik led the Polar Bears. Smerekanich dished out 11 assists, had two kills and had an ace, while Guzik had five kills on 11 attempts for a .455 hitting percentage.
Recently named Sports Import/AVCA Division III National Player of the Week Renee Berry played in all three sets and led the Polar Bears with 10 kills and a .500 hitting percentage. She also had six digs.
Northern was tough from the service box all night with nine assists. Junior Abby Schaller and sopomore Kasey Roeser each had a team-high with two, while freshman Kelsie Zumberger, Berry, senior Liz Schnelle, senior Lindsey Pruneski and Smerekanich each had one.
Zumberger has 18 assists in two sets, Schaller had seven kills in three sets and Roeser had 15 digs in two sets.
Pruneski also had a solid .500 hitting percentage with four kills on eight attempts.
Roeser set the tone early by serving the first six points of the match, including both her aces.
Schnelle had six kills on the night to give her 1,724 for her career and keep her in second place all-time. She is now 66 kills away from tying Hannah Kanuckel for first all-time with 1,788.
Northern will again be in action this Friday at Saturday at the Washington (Mo.) National Invitational in St. Louis to face four nationally-ranked opponent over the two day tournament.