TOLEDO, Ohio – The NIU volleyball team (22-5, 14-1 MAC) made short work of Toledo (15-12, 87 MAC) on Friday night at Savage Arena, defeating the Rockets in straight sets, 25-23, 25-22, 25-11. Four Huskies registered eight or more kills, paced by
Mary Grace Kelly's (Strongsville, Ohio/Walsh Jesuit) 11-kill night and
Meg Wolowicz's (Manitowoc, Wis./Lincoln) eight-kill, .615 hitting performance.
Taylor Krage (St. Charles, Ill./St. Charles North) and
Lauren Zielinski (Oak Forest, Ill./Marist) both added eight kills as well with Krage hitting .318 in the match. Wolowicz also added four blocks in the match, including one solo in the effort. Krage also tallied a career-high 14 digs.
"We knew were going to have another tough West Division battle with Toledo tonight and they played well. Those first couple of sets were good challenges for both teams," said Head Coach
Ray Gooden. "They did a good job of keeping us a step behind for a while there but we were able to do some things to counter and win the right points. We scored in chunks in the last set and that was a big thing for us."
The Huskies and Rockets traded points in the first period with Toledo leading early. NIU rallied in the middle of the match, scoring four unanswered points to tie the contest, 14-14. The squads continued to trade points until both reached 22 as the Huskies were sparked by their first of eight blocks on the night. NIU would take two of the next three games to win the set in deuce, 25-23.
With an 11-10 lead in the second set, NIU went on another four-point run to force the media timeout, 15-10. Toledo closed the gap to one point several times but the Huskies did not acquiesce the lead as they took the set with the final two points, 25-22.
In the third set, the Huskies made short work of the Rockets building a 10-point lead halfway through the frame and using only three servers in the process, 16-6, as
Chandler Kinley (Lexington, Ky./Lafayette) Krage and Radtke setup the Huskies offense.
Closing the last set in just about 20 minutes, NIU clinched the match with the 25-11 third set victory as it totaled 14 kills with a .414 hitting percentage. Wolowicz led NIU with four kills in the frame to complete her error free night.
Northern Illinois University will close the regular season on Saturday night, taking on Ball State in Worthen Arena in Muncie, Ind. First serve is scheduled for 6 p.m. Central.
