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WESTERVILLE, Ohio – The Cardinal women's volleyball team dropped its Ohio Athletic Conference (OAC) opener Wednesday evening, falling in straight sets to visiting Heidelberg University inside the Rike Center.

Otterbein University, now 7-6 overall on the season, will finish the week at the Franklin (Ind.) Tri-match this coming Saturday. The Cards play Manchester at 3 p.m. and the host Grizzlies at 5 p.m.

Otterbein started slow against the Student Princes (10-3), getting as close as 12-11 in the first set by trailing the entire way. Heidelberg, which saw standout middle hitter Sarah Parker go down with an early injury but later return, used an 8-3 run midway through the frame to assume the 1-0 match lead.

The second set was tied early, 4-4, before Heidelberg slow began to pull away, going on a 7-2 spurt and pulling away to win 25-16.

Otterbein found a stride to begin the third game, scoring four-straight points to break an 8-8 tie and force a Heidelberg timeout. The Student Princes responded out of the quick break, closing the gap and winning an extremely long rally a few points later to capture some momentum back.

The set would see ties at 14-14, 15-15 and 16-16 before the visitors at 20-17. The Cards would make one last push, tying the score back up at 21-21 before the 'Berg closed the night on a 4-0 run.

Jamie Kluding tallied a match-high 12 kills for Heidelberg, which hit .266 as a team compared to just .120 for the Cardinals. Janessa Scott added 11 kills for the away squad.

No Otterbein player made it into double-digit kills, with Maddy Shelly posting nine while Maria Thornton and Morgan Lowenkamp each had seven. Thornton hit .294 with just two errors on 17 attempts.

Otterbein's Andrea Miller handed out 24 assists while Karlie DiRuzza finished with a match-high 35 on the opposite side.