Sunday, October 2, 2005 9:54 PM CDT
Bennett finds herself right at home in OVC
By RICK DAWSON, Staff Writer
CHARLESTON -- This OVC tour doesn't seem all that difficult for Lori Bennett.
Getting its first chance to avenge last year's Ohio Valley Conference tournament loss to Eastern Kentucky, Eastern Illinois' volleyball team rebounded from a slow start to win 28-30, 30-28, 30-23, 30-27 at Lantz Arena Saturday. The win vaulted the Lady Panthers into a two-way tie with Jacksonville State atop the conference and pushed Bennett to 4-0 in the OVC in her first go-round, against a team she once played for to boot.
"There was just a lot on the line today since we only get to play them one time before the tournament," Bennett said. "It was important in a lot of ways."
Eastern, 8-4 overall, triumphed for the sixth consecutive time in a fashion that was reminiscent to the way it defeated DePaul in helping jump-start the streak. The Lady Colonels (11-5, 3-1 OVC) led from the opening serve until late in the second game, when Kera Griffin and Maren Crabtree blocked 6-foot outside Amy Arlinghaus to give Eastern its first lead at 23-22.
The Lady Panthers evened the match on Eastern Kentucky's game-ending service error and never trailed by more than five afterward, using a 6-1 run in the final game to build a 20-15 lead then getting kills from Kara Sorenson and Megan Kennedy to break a 24-all tie and seal the match.
"We always start off slower," said Crabtree, who had 58 of Eastern's 65 assists and 20 digs. "We still even did that today. But we came back."
Four different players, in fact, reached double figures in kills, the first time that had happened since the four-game win over DePaul Sept. 21. Sorenson had a career-high 17, Jessica Ackerman 16 and Kennedy and Mary Welch 12 each. Coming from the back row, Sorenson slid to the right for multiple open looks while Ackerman began hitting with increased proficiency from the outside.
"Sometimes they wouldn't even have blockers and we just kept running back and back, and that's what worked a lot," Crabtree said.
"(Sorenson) was hitting like a 1.000."
Sorenson led Eastern in attack percentage (.378). The team was at its peak in the third game, committing only three hitting errors. Ackerman had six of her kills during the game, all of them in the course of a rally from a 15-12 deficit.
The Lady Colonels wound up with 73 kills n four more than EIU — 40 of them in the first two games.
"I don't know that we did (stop them), honestly," Bennett said. "Their middle (Guard) hit .341 and the other one (Brozek) only hit .111. But Liz is good. She's a great player and she gets up fast so it's hard to defend against her. I don't feel like we stopped her at all. I just felt like we slowed her down enough and were able to have some success when she was in the front row and then a lot when she was in the back row."
Losses on the road to Kentucky and Illinois in September when Eastern started the year 2-4, more than just now forgotten, seem to have prepared it for its OVC run. The win could eventually give the Lady Panthers needed leverage when the site of the conference tournament is determined.
"Our competition at the beginning of the year helped us prepare for teams like this, definitely," Ackerman said. "They're one of the better teams in our conference so playing the Illinois, the Kentuckys, definitely helped us."
Contact Rick Dawson at rdawson@jg-tc.com or 238-6855.
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