Hiram, Ohio - The Oberlin College volleyball team had a 2-1 match lead but the Hiram College Terriers rallied to defeat the Yeowomen in five sets (26-24, 22-25, 25-20, 25-27, 7-15) on Tuesday night at Price Gymnasium.
Oberlin appeared to be in control and inline to take the match with a 20-15 lead in the fourth set but the Terriers would rip off eight of the next nine points to claim a 23-21 advantage. Back-to-back kills from
Andréa Jones would stop the run and tie the stanza at 23-23. Another Jones' send-down would again level the count at 25-25 but an OC error and a Brooke Norris ace kept the Terriers alive and forced the decisive fifth frame.
Hiram used the momentum from the comeback, jumping all over Oberlin from the onset in the race to 15 points by opening up a 7-2 advantage and never looking back.
Four Yeowomen finished with double figure kills, led by 21 from Jones. Senior
Lauren Sands poured in 19, while
Natalie Dufour and
Cami Sweet finished with 12 and 10, respectively.
Taylor Gwynne dished out 57 assists while
Zeynep Kaya dropped in three of Oberlin's eight aces.
IrisA rchibald led the back-row effort with 26 digs, while Sands (14), Kaya (13),
Jillian Jendsen (13), and Gwynne (12) each reached double-digits as well.
Oberlin trailed 24-21 in the first set but closed the session with five straight points to earn the victory. Unfortunately, the Terriers would turn the tables in the second set as OC led 20-11 but the Terriers ripped off an unprecedented 11 straight points en route to stealing the set.
Oberlin regrouped by turning in a wire-to-wire win in the third set and led by as many as six points in the fourth before it all unraveled in the end.
The loss dropped the Yeowomen to 12-6 overall and 3-4 in the NCAC. Hiram moved to 9-15 and 3-3 in the NCAC and by virtue of the victory have leaped ahead of Oberlin in the conference standings.
Oberlin, which will either be the number five or six seed in the NCAC Tournament, has four more non-conference contests remaining on its schedule starting on Saturday with a pair of matches against Pitt-Greensburg (2 p.m.) and Penn State Behrend (4 p.m.).
