Box Score
The Carthage College women’s volleyball team (29-5, 7-0 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin), ranked eighth in the Nov. 3 American Volleyball Coaches Association NCAA Division III poll and third in the Oct. 28 NCAA Division III Midwest Regional poll, swept North Park University (9-19, 0-7 CCIW), 3-0, on Tuesday, Nov. 3 in a play-in match of the CCIW Women’s Volleyball Tournament at the Tarble Arena in Kenosha, Wis. The top-seeded Lady Reds’ winning scores over the eighth-seeded Vikings were 25-10, 25-12 and 25-7 in a match that took just 51 minutes to complete.
Carthage jumped out to a 9-2 lead in the first set over the Vikings. The Lady Reds pulled away easily, opening up a 12-point lead, 18-6, en route to a 25-10 decision. In the second set, Carthage led by four, 10-6, before using a 7-2 run to go up by nine, 17-8. The Lady Reds closed out the set with an 8-4 edge to win by 13, 25-12. Carthage left nothing to chance in the third and final set, taking a 10-0 lead before the Vikings got on the scoreboard. The Lady Reds out-scored the Vikings, 15-7, the rest of the way to win by 18 points, 25-7.
In the three other play-in matches, second-seeded North Central College (33-3) defeated seventh-seeded Augustana College (Ill., 11-21), 3-1, with winning set scores of , 25-20, 25-16, 21-25 and 25-20; sixth-seeded Millikin University (19-19) upended third-seeded Illinois Wesleyan University (19-16), 3-1, with winning set scores of 25-20, 19-25, 25-22 and 25-15; and fourth-seeded Elmhurst College (17-16) knocked off fifth-seeded Wheaton College (Ill., 17-16), 3-0, with winning scores of 25-20, 25-20 and 25-15.
Carthage will play host to conference tournament on Friday-Saturday, Nov. 6-7, also at Tarble Arena. The Lady Reds will take on Elmhurst in a Friday semifinal match at 7 p.m., with Millikin playing North Central in the other semifinal contest at 4:30 p.m. The tournament-championship gets underway at 2 p.m. on Saturday, with the winner receiving the league’s automatic qualifier to the NCAA Division III Women’s Volleyball Championship.