The No. 12 ranked Ithaca College volleyball team played its final regular season game at Ben Light Gymnasium, staying undefeated at home with a shutout win against the University of Scranton Royals on Oct. 29. The Bombers won their 16th game in a row, bringing their overall record to 20-3.
The Bombers partnered with the IC chapter of the Association for Women in Sports Media, known as AWSM, for a “Dig Pink” breast cancer awareness game. AWSM sold pink t-shirts outside the gym, featured an all-female media team and the players wore pink ribbons to show their support.
The match started steady, 4-4, before the Bombers took advantage of the miscommunication errors by the Royals’ starting six. First-year middle hitter and right side Addison Leadbetter started a Bomber 10-0 run, tapping a ball into a hole of the defense near the right sideline. The Royals found themselves guilty of two attacking errors and two missed blocks, giving the Bombers a 13-4 lead.
Sophomore Brianna Owen’s serving rhythm kept the Royals’ back row on their toes, helping create scoring opportunities for the South Hill squad.
“I try to keep a routine,” Owen said. “Typically, we always do a pregame ritual, like screaming in the corner and yell[ing] affirmations. So that really gets me hyped.”
The Royals put three in a row on the board, but Leadbetter stopped the chance for a momentum change on a slide hit that landed in the deep back corner, assisted by a graceful back set from junior setter Wesley Slavin.
In the next few minutes, both teams gave each other chances for easy points. The Royals took a much-needed timeout trailing 20-14 after committing three errors.
Despite some strong attacks from the Royals’ front row, their mistakes pushed them behind the Bombers, who claimed set one 25-19.
Owen started set two, continuing to emerge as a threat to the Royals’ right side. She delivered a punishing attack from a perfectly placed running back row set by Slavin to the arms of the Royals defenders, who could not quite get a strong enough block.
“I really try out of my peripheral to see the block so I can hit around it,” Owen said. “[I try] to know when I can fully swing and when I can’t, and [see] those open spots.”
Owen, who is listed as an outside hitter, middle blocker and right side, has been an important and versatile member of the Bombers’ offense. She recorded a season high of 12 kills during the match.
Both sides’ rhythm began to deteriorate even further, with eight of the next 12 points given to each other from errors.
The next point, the Bombers and Royals fought in a long rally ending in a Bomber miscue. Leadbetter dropped the serve in between two defenders, who jointly popped the ball up. The Royals tipped it over the net, but Slavin’s quick reflexes gave Leadbetter the opportunity to take the second ball, which set up junior outside hitter Naomi Clauhs for a push to the back of the court.
The Royals tried a similar scheme again and the Bombers responded in an almost identical fashion. The Royals’ libero dove to keep the ball up and they attempted yet another tip over the blockers. The opponents battled even more out of system and the Royals were granted the point to tie the set 6-6.
The Bombers and Royals fought hard the rest of set two, but the Bombers’ play at the net helped them take the edge over the Royals. Leadbetter played a critical role in the Bombers’ big blocking presence, recording her career single game high of six total blocks. The South Hill squad concluded the set with 4 total blocks, exceeding their season average of 1.93 per set. They took the second set 25-20.
In the third set, the Bombers began strong on a 7-1 run from kills by Owen, junior outside hitter Gabriela Gonzalez-Abreu and Leadbetter, and two service aces by graduate student libero Ellie Benedict.
The Royals started a comeback, making the score 7-6, but never got their offense on a true tempo. They struggled to make plays, which resulted in .024 hitting percentage for the set and .089 for the match. They also had 20 attack errors with only 31 kills total.
For the 12th Bomber point, The Royals received Gonzalez-Abreu’s serve, then tried to attack down the middle. Leadbetter denied them, jumping straight up for a clean single block. The Royals’ libero reacted quickly, keeping the ball up. Both sides sent it over several times before the Royals tried a tip to the 10-foot line, but Benedict was ready to make a clean lay-out dive to save the play. Slavin kept it up and set Clauhs for a ball deep in on the back line of the court for the kill. The South Hill squad began to taste the feeling of an undefeated season at the Ben Light.
The Bombers dominated the rest of the set, taking it 25-15 to defeat the Royals in three. This marked the Bombers ninth shutout of the season.
The Bombers will finish out their regular season away Nov. 1 in a double-header in Annandale-on-Hudson against Bard College and New Jersey City University, then will travel Nov. 7 down south to Atlanta to compete in the Emory Invitational before beginning their journey to a possible fourth straight Liberty League Championship Tournament.
