Resilient Lions Rally Past Newberry
The Mars Hill volleyball team prevailed over Newberry in five sets on Friday night, picking up their first South Atlantic Conference victory of 2014 with a 3-2 victory.
NEWBERRY, S.C.- The Mars Hill volleyball team prevailed over Newberry in five sets on Friday night, picking up their first South Atlantic Conference victory of 2014 with a 3-2 victory. Mars Hill improves to 2-7 on the season and 1-1 in league play while Newberry drops to 6-4 and 0-2.
Lauren Hochstetler, Mary Kate Griffin and Rebecca Butler each finished with double-digits in kills, with Hochstetler setting the pace with 15. Christen Nicholson led the Lions with a season-high 31 digs. Butler and Hochstetler posted double-doubles with 18 and 12 digs respectively. Victoria Kaiser had 11 digs.
After dropping the opening set 25-16, the Lions tied the match at 1 with a 25-21 set two victory. In the third set, Mars Hill held a 24-23 lead before the Wolves scored three straight points for a 26-24 win and a 2-1 lead in the match.
Undeterred by the close loss in the previous set, the Lions forced a deciding fifth set with a convincing 25-12 win in set four. Mars Hill held a 10-7 lead before going on a 15-5 run to close out the set, hitting a season-high .419 in the process and scoring 15 of their 25 points on kills.
Newberry took an 8-2 lead in the fifth set before a Butler kill began the Lions' final charge of the night. A Hochstetler service ace pulled Mars Hill to within three, 9-6, before the Lions knotted the score at 11 thanks to five Newberry errors. The teams traded points before consecutive Nicholson service aces secured the win for the Lions.
Mars Hill continues its South Carolina SAC tour tomorrow afternoon at 2 p.m. against Anderson.
