As Ohio is preparing for the Mid-American Conference Tournament to begin Friday, the rest of the MAC will have its sights set on the No. 1 seeded Bobcats, who dominated the conference in the regular season.
Ohio (19-9 14-2 MAC) produced five MAC East players of the week, who combined to receive the honors on eight occasions this season, including sweeping this week’s awards.
The Bobcats also defeated every conference opponent at least once, except for Central Michigan — who defeated Ohio two weeks ago, ending a 12-match winning streak. During that winning streak, all of which occurring in conference play, the Bobcats lost only four of 40 sets and is the program’s longest winning streak since 2007.
This past weekend, Ohio made its second consecutive road trip to finish the regular season, when the Bobcats defeated Buffalo and Akron to clinch the MAC Title.
“This past weekend was very exciting,” Ohio coach Ryan Theis said. “We were thrilled to not only get both wins and have a chance to be co-champions for the MAC, but also excited to see Northern Illinois knock off (Bowling Green) to give us the outright title.”
Not only did the Bobcats secure the best record in the conference, but they also finished as the conference’s best team in hitting percentage, opponent hitting percentage and blocks in the MAC.
Ohio also ranked among the top three schools in assists, kills and digs in conference play, led by a trio of players that achieved individual success.
After leading the category since the beginning of the season, sophomore middle blocker Serena Warner finished with the best average blocks per set with 1.31, ranking 35th in the NCAA. Warner also finished fourth in the MAC in service aces.
Sophomore outside hitter Kelly Lamberti — who was a three-time MAC East offensive player of the week — recorded the second highest average kills per set in the MAC with an average of 4.22.
The only other member of the Bobcats to finish in the top three of an individual statistical category is freshman libero Meredith Ashy, who notched the third-highest digs per set, with an average of 4.98 in MAC play.
The Bobcats will take on No. 8 Ball State on Friday to open tournament action. Ohio swept Ball State 3-0 in October, but Theis is not taking the matchup lightly, and said the Cardinals battled unfortunate injuries the majority of the season.
“We think we can do a pretty good job defensively, but we need to score points on offense to win,” Theis said. “This will continue to be our focus moving forward, but we have a tough one-eight match-up.”
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