WESTERVILLE — The Otterbein volleyball team opened its 2024 Ohio Athletic Conference schedule Tuesday night with a 3-1 victory over Baldwin Wallace. The Cardinals won 25-22, 25-17, 24-26, 27-25 in what was a tightly contested match.

The Basics

• Records: Otterbein (9-5 overall, 1-0 OAC), Baldwin Wallace (8-5 overall, 0-1 OAC) 
• Venue: Rike Center - Westerville, Ohio

Otterbein Stat Leaders

• Four Cardinals tallied double-digit kills led by 16 from freshman Chandler Crowell. Seniors Kennedy Hoffman and Kristen Scherger had 13 apiece, and freshman Emerson Baum added 11.
• Scherger hit .500 with just one error in 24 total attacks.
• Senior Amanda Troyer led the way with 26 digs to go with 16 from junior Olivia Vitaz.
• Vitaz tallied 32 assists, while freshman Kaitlyn Schram added 20.

Match Highlights

• Baldwin Wallace scored four of the first five points of the opening set, but Otterbein came back to take a 6-5 lead. Neither team led by more than three points the rest of the way. With the score tied at 21, kills from Crowell and sophomore Makenzie Schellenberger put Otterbein up by two before the Yellow Jackets answered with a kill. The Cardinals responded with two straight points via a BW service error and kill from Baum to win the set.
• Otterbein jumped out to an 8-3 lead in the second set and later used a 5-0 run to take a 20-12 edge. That run included kills from Scherger and Hoffman. The Cardinals led the rest of the way en route to the 25-17 victory capped by a kill from Crowell.
• The very tightly contested third set featured 10 ties. A 3-0 Yellow Jacket run put the visitors up 21-18 late in the set, but the Cardinals came back to tie the score at 24 after trailing 23-20. Baldwin Wallace scored the next two points, however, to win the set 26-24.
• The fourth set also required extra points to decide. BW led 16-10 midway through. A 3-0 Otterbein run brought the Cardinals within two, 20-18, but the Yellow Jackets continued to lead, eventually taking a 24-22 edge. Looking to avoid going to a fifth set, the Cardinals put together a 3-0 run that included an ace from Schram and kill from Crowell for a 25-24 lead. BW scored the next point to tie the score, but back-to-back kills from Scherger and Hoffman clinched the match for Otterbein.
• Otterbein finished with 64 kills while hitting .237, and Baldwin Wallace finished with 42 kills while hitting .159.

Quotes

• Senior Kennedy Hoffman: "This win was absolutely crucial. The first game of conference play is always a super important one to set the tone for the rest of the year, and Baldwin Wallace is definitely a good team, and we look forward to seeing them in the tournament. It's good to get this win in the books."
• Head coach Monica Wright: "This was a pretty tough draw for our first conference match. Baldwin Wallace is a really solid team. They have a lot of athletes on the floor with a good mix of experienced leadership and good, young players. We knew they would come ready to play. They've been a little up and down this year, but so have we. They came out and pushed us, and hopefully we are primed for understanding that we're going to have to play a little better down the road if we want to stay on the winning side."

Notables

• Otterbein is 15-3 against Baldwin Wallace since 2010 and has now won six straight matchups in the series. The Yellow Jackets' last win over the Cardinals was a 3-1 victory in Westerville in March 2021.
• Head coach Monica Wright is in her 18th year at Otterbein and boasts an all-time record of 363-182 at the helm of the Cardinals. 
• Troyer ranks fifth all-time at Otterbein in career service aces (137) and sixth all-time in career digs (1,402).
• Vitaz has 1,272 career assists.
• Hoffman has 850 career kills.