By: Hunter Ongay
Ball State Sports Link
Ball State women’s volleyball has been dominant all season, and it showed against the Miami RedHawks Saturday night in Worthen Arena. The Cardinals carried out yet another three-set sweep to increase to a 15-straight set win streak. BSU’s last set loss came against Toledo, in set one on October 19th. But Saturday night, it was all Cardinals.
Juniors Natalie Risi and Natalie Mitchem shut down the RedHawk offense with dominating performances at the net. They both capitalized on the offensive stat columns with 15 kills for Mitchem and nine for Risi. Lauren Gilliland added 10 kills and a block on the night to add another weapon to the Cardinal offense.
Set one was capped by a dominating run after the set break, to hold Miami at bay with a 6-2 run. Set two looked a little different as Miami kept it close through the majority of the set, but without fail, Ball State was able to hold the lead and ride into a set two victory with little resistance.
The third and final set was absolutely dominated by the Cardinal attack. Not much got by the front line of Mitchem, Risi, Wielonski, Plitt, and Gilliland. Racking up a game total of six blocks, Miami could not get their offense into a rhythm, suffering a 25-13 end to set three and allowing Ball State to head to 22-3 on the season.
The Cardinal look forward to taking on Chippewas Thursday and Friday nights to start a road swing before heading back to Worthen Arena for Mid-American Conference play in a few weeks.
