KENOSHA, Wis. – The Carthage College Red Men turned in their best two hitting matches of the season on Saturday in a triangular with College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin opponents, sweeping both North Central College and Augustana College at Tarble Arena, 3-0.
The pair of victories for the #3 Red Men sends Carthage to 10-0 on the season, while a 1-1 day for North Central sends them to 5-6 on the year and Augustana falls to 3-7.
"Picking up two wins always makes for a good day," said head coach LJ Marx. "We had to deal with making some lineup adjustments this week due to injuries so it was great to see the team stay calm and trust everyone to do their part. North central is a good team that will challenge us to play better in a few weeks when we open conference and Augie is a solid first year program. We'll have to clean up a few things before Wednesday, especially from the service line. Dominican will be a really tough battle that we will need to be ready for."
#3 Carthage 3, North Central 0
Carthage opened the day with a season-best .344 attack against the Cardinals after hitting .385, .282 and .393 to win three sets [25-15, 27-25, 25-23]. The Red Men paired the strong hitting with a dominant block at the net, as the Red Men returned ten of the Cardinals attacks to just one for North Central.
Junior setter
Matt Reinsel spread the ball around very well in the win, collecting his third 40-plus assist match of the season and his first in a three-setter with 42, allowing three of his teammates to reach double figures in kills.
Evan Walsh led the Red Men with 13 kills in the match, followed by
Mason Moore with 12 and
Zach Lillig with 11.
Walsh also recorded three of the Red Men's five aces, with
Matt Slivinski picking up the other pair, and led all players with five blocks. Moore added a career-high ten digs in the win, just one ahead of
Tony Allen with nine.
#3 Carthage 3, Augustana 0
Despite not being quite as sharp as they were in the first match, the Red Men took care of business in the first ever meeting with the Vikings for their second sweep of the day and seventh on the season [25-13, 25-18, 25-19]. In each set, the Red Men allowed the Vikings to hang around. However, timely blocks seemed to be the difference as Carthage finished with 13 in the match to limit Augustana to a -.038 attack versus the Red Men's .312.
Reinsel had another big match in the win, recording season-highs in digs and aces with eight and two respectively, and a match-high 33 assists.
Tony Allen equaled Reinsel in digs with eight of his own and
Max Bongratz had a season-best seven blocks to edge out
Evan Walsh's six.
Walsh was the lone Carthage player with double-digit kills in the afternoon match, turning in 13 to lead all players in the match.
The Red Men return to action on Wednesday, February 14th with a trip to Dominican University in another nationally ranked showdown. First serve between the #3 Red Men and #7 Stars is set for 7:00 p.m.
