BEXLEY, Ohio – The Otterbein volleyball team kicked off "Rivalry Weekend" with a straight-set victory across town Friday night, sweeping host Capital by scores of 25-23, 25-13, 25-22.
The Cardinals (20-7, 8-1) clinch at least a share of the Ohio Athletic Conference regular-season for a second-straight year, and can win the league outright should Ohio Northern fall at Mount Union Saturday afternoon. If ONU were to win, Otterbein would assume the No. 2 seed in next week's OAC Tournament as a result of its recent head-to-head loss against the Polar Bears.
Otterbein reaches 20 victories for the seventh time under head coach
Monica Wright, who has now guided the program to four different OAC championships (two regular-season, two tournament) in her 12 seasons at the helm.
Capital (0-25, 0-9 OAC) threw everything it had in the first set, holding leads of 16-13 and 20-17 before the Cards kicked into gear. Otterbein rallied to tie the score at 21, 22 and 23 followed by consecutive kills from
Tate Eppard and
Hadley Sterett.
Otterbein carried that momentum into a lopsided second frame, turning an early 9-7 score into a 16-8 lead and never looking back. The Crusaders won three-straight points to temporarily stop the bleeding, at 16-11, but the Cardinals countered with five-straight of their own to pull away.
Capital admirably went toe-to-toe once again in the third set, jumping out to a strong 13-5 cushion and then standing on top at 19-15 later on. Otterbein found its footing once more, winning four-straight points to knot the scoreboard and then emerging down the stretch behind a couple more points from Eppard and Sterett.
Sterett (17-5-33) and Eppard (9-2-14) combined for 26 kills on the night while hard-hitting freshman
Julia Vermilion added another seven on the outside. That was all centered around
Andrea Miller's 37 assists and libero
Ashlyn Leon's 16 digs.
Otterbein hit a swift .323 as a unit while limiting the Crusaders to just a .109 percentage. Delanie Nahikian had eight kills for the home side.
The Cards finish out their regular-season Saturday morning, making a quick turnaround and traveling across 70-West for brunch with No. 3-ranked Wittenberg. Match time is slated for 11 a.m.
