SOUTH EUCLID, OH – The Notre Dame College volleyball team (15-14, 6-8 MEC) hosted Wheeling University (22-5, 13-1 MEC) on Friday evening for Senior Night and the final home contest of the 2021 season for the Falcons. Seniors
Katie Richardson (#4) and
Amelia Kaeberlein (#18) were honored prior to the match. However, Wheeling rained on the NDC parade by a score of 3-0.
In the first set, Notre Dame started out hot and jumped out to a 10-4 lead, forcing a Wheeling timeout. The Cardinals would respond with eight of the next ten points and tie the contest at 12-12. Furthermore, the two sides would exchange runs and wrestle to 25-25. However, Wheeling would go on to steal the first set 27-25. In the second set, NDC looked deflated and faced a quick 10-3 deficit. The Falcons would never be able claw back into the set as WU dominated the second stanza, 25-14. The third set offered much of the same as Notre Dame trialed at 8-4 and 17-9 in the final set. A strong Wheeling team would polish off the match 25-13.
On offense,
Kaye Dregalla led NDC for the fourth straight match with a team-high eight kills.
Blaire Barr (6),
Kelsie Palmer (5), Richardson (3),
Brittany Miller (3),
Grace Smotek (3) and
Carli Derda (2) were the other Falcons recording kills on the evening to tally 30 as a team (.083 hit percentage). Setters
McKenzie Andrix (14) and
Jayme Zoeckler (13) paced NDC in assists as the Falcons created 30 as a squad. Zoeckler and
Ellie Schenk were the only Falcons to grab service aces as each player generated one.
On defense, and coming off MEC Defensive Player of the Week honors, Kaeberlein posted a team-high 14 digs. 11 other NDC Falcons posted digs to total 39 as a team. At the net, Barr (3), Derda (3), Richardson (3) and Dregalla (1) swatted Wheeling attacks to tally six as a team.
Notre Dame College will be back in action on Tuesday Nov. 9 at 7 p.m. at Frostburg State University, before traveling to Alderson Broaddus University on Friday Nov. 12 at 7 p.m. for the Falcons regular season finale.
The Mountain East Conference Tournament is scheduled to begin on Thursday Nov. 18 when the top eight teams in the MEC will be in action. NDC currently sits in seventh place within the MEC.
