LANCASTER, Pa. – McDaniel rallied from a 2-1 deficit to defeat Franklin & Marshall 3-2 in the first round of the 2017 Centennial Conference (CC) volleyball tournament on Wednesday.
Taylor Bauman (Charlottesville, Va./Albemarle) recorded 29 digs and two aces to lead the Green Terror (19-7), who advanced to Saturday's conference semifinals at Johns Hopkins. Emma Lorenzen (Hagerstown, Md./South Hagerstown) and Teryn Rath (Grass Valley, Calif./Bear River) led a balanced attack with 10 kills each.
Casey Morrow led the Diplomats (16-12) with 11 kills.
After Rath and Morrow traded kills to open the fifth set, Rath knocked down a second kill to give McDaniel a lead it did not relinquish.
A ball-handling error and Lorenzen ace stretched the lead to 4-1 and the lead swelled as 9-2 after back-to-back Gayle Edelstein (Livingston, N.J./Livingston) aces. Franklin & Marshall drew to within 12-9 but a Marlowe Embry(Milpitas, Calif./J.H. Pitman) kill and two more from Lorenzen sealed the victory and helped the Green Terror improve to 4-2 in five-set matches this season and 4-0 all-time in the CC tournament.
McDaniel jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the opening set before three straight Diplomat points evened the set at 20-all. Tied at 23-all, a Hayley Mills (Bowie, Md./St. Vincent Pallotti) kill and F&M error sealed a 25-23 victory.
The Diplomats used an 11-4 run in the second set to turn a 3-all deadlock into a 14-7 lead on back-to-back Morrow kills and a Christine Yoo knockdown. Franklin & Marshall ultimately took the set, 25-15.
The third set followed a similar trend. A pair of Yoo aces keyed a 5-0 run to open a 7-2 lead en route to a 25-15 win.
After six ties early in the fourth set, kills by Embry and Allie Lugar (Wilmington, Del./Dupont) helped the visitors reel off six straight points to open up a 15-9 advantage en route to a 25-16 victory.
Embry added nine kills and 19 digs while Lugar had six kills. Lauren Wells (Glen Allen, Va./Glen Allen) chipped in 16 assists while Edelstein had 13 assists and three aces.