ST. LOUIS, Mo. – The Carthage College Lady Reds started the weekend off in style, sweeping the competition with a pair of 3-0 wins to open the 2018 Bear Invitational hosted by Washington University, defeating MacMurray College and the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology on Friday.
The pair of wins moves the #13 Lady Reds to 4-2 on the year, while MacMurray falls to 1-5 and Rose-Hulman drops to 4-3.
"It was a good team day for the Lady Reds," said head coach
Leanne Ulmer. "Some strong play at the net and
Ellie LeCount running a good offense made tonight possible.
Megan Behrendt is always one of our top kill getters and she added good passing and defense tonight. I thought our freshmen middle
Nicole Acton and sophomore opposite
Linda Morton had good nights offensively. I am looking forward to two tough matches tomorrow!"
#13 Carthage 3, MacMurray 0
The Lady Reds dominated the opener in a match that saw the Lady Reds hit above .222 in all three sets, while the Highlanders failed to hit above .000 in any set, finishing with just 12 kills in the match and 16 errors. Carthage had 12 kills in the second and third sets each.
The Lady Reds also dominated from the service line, rattling off a season-high 14 aces, including four from
Megan Behrendt and three from
Ellie LeCount. Behrendt, who hit .458 in the win, added a match-high 11 kills without committing an attack error and LeCount served up 27 assists in the win.
Defensively,
Sarah Grabowski led Carthage with 12 digs and
Nicole Acton had a pair of blocks.
#13 Carthage 3, Rose Hulman 0
Carthage turned in its second-best hitting performance of the young season in the night-cap of the doubleheader, hitting .290 in the three-set win, which Carthage took handedly, 25-19, 25-17, 25-12.
Individually, LeCount and Grabowski bested their first match with 29 assists and 14 digs respectively, while
Shannon Kebisek and
Linda Morton led Carthage with 11 and nine kills apiece.
Morton was also a force defensively at the net as well with three blocks, finishing just one behind
Katie Laio, who had a match-high four in the win.
The Lady Reds will return the courts at Wash U tomorrow, as Carthage opens Saturday's action with Birmingham-Southern University at 10:30 a.m., before closing the weekend out with a nationally-ranked matchup the #19 hosts at 2:30 p.m.
