In a match that saw Ohio coach Geoff Carlston reach 200 wins as the team’s head coach, Ohio (6-8, 2-1 Mid-American Conference) went the distance against Toledo (9-7, 2-2 MAC). The match was a heavily contested 3-2 win that saw four of its five sets finish within 3 points.
Ohio’s first set was marked by frequent errors. Through the early season, Ohio has struggled to prevent unearned points from giving its opponents early advantages. That trend continued as the Bobcats gave the Rockets an early 8-4 lead, four errors making up the advantage.
The first error for Toledo wouldn’t come until it had built a 16-12 lead on Ohio, with Ohio tallying seven attack and service errors in the meantime. The discrepancy was the difference, as Ohio would continuously end its runs on errors, totaling eight service errors in the first set.
Late in the set, however, something flipped for the Bobcats, who proceeded to go on a 7-0 run, led by sophomore Leah Shumate, taking the lead at 23-21. The teams would go back and forth, but a timely 3-0 stretch at the end sealed the set for Ohio 29-27.
“We missed eight serves in the first set and won it,” Carlston said. “I don’t ever recall even hearing about a team doing that.”
The second and third sets were not plagued with errors but would go to Toledo, causing Ohio to fall into a 1-2 deficit. Both sets were won by two points, 26-24 and 29-27 respectively.
The second set started slowly but picked up as the Bobcats, led by sophomore Kam Hunt, went on a 6-0 run, capped off by a service ace by Hunt. Hunt stuffed the stat sheet, finishing one kill shy of her career-high (26) and logging a new high in digs (19).
Several other Bobcats would log career highs in different stats, including freshman Darbi Ricketts, who logged new highs in kills (15), assists (three), digs (22) and points (17); freshman Bryn Janke with a new high in assists (38) and sophomore Kendall Hickey with a new career high in digs (41). Hickey contributed her success to the team.
“Our block was amazing tonight,” Hickey said. “They made really good setups all the way across the court and that helped us a lot … when the block is good, the defense can see better, and when the defense can see better we get more digs.”
The contributions were enough to help Ohio win through competitive sets, but the game started to shift in the fourth set, which saw Ohio win 25-14 in the largest margin of victory of the match. Ricketts started at the service line for Ohio, setting Hunt up for three straight kills to start a 5-0 run. The Rockets would fire back with a 3-0 run of their own, but Ohio was playing with extra intensity and ran away with the tying set.
“There wasn’t really a lot of adjustments to make,” Carlston said. “We didn’t change a lot up, we just needed to play better through the finish line.”
And finish the Bobcats did. The fifth and final set, which sees the total points needed drop to 15, saw Ohio get out to a 6-2 start. Ohio would control most of the set, aside from a 5-1 run from Toledo that saw Ohio lose its lead, 10-9.
From then on, the teams would trade strikes, going back and forth until the game was tied 11-11. From there, the Bobcats would get through the finish line beautifully, when Janke faked the set and threw the ball over the net for the lead.
Toledo would never regain the lead as Ohio would tally 5 of the last 6 points en route to a 15-12 victory, as Carlston’s career milestone was announced to The Convo. Ohio will take its home court again Saturday at 4 p.m. looking to sweep Toledo before heading to Kalamazoo, Michigan.
