(Sylvania, OH) Concordia Women's Volleyball concluded its regular season with a road contest at Lourdes University. In a tight matchup with the Gray Wolves, the Cardinals fell behind early and were unable to mount a comeback, dropping the match 3-1.
Claudia Grepke led the team with 12 kills, followed by Breann June and Jessalyn Peavyhouse with 10 and 8 respectively. Jillian Kendrick paced the team with 23 assists in the match, while Breann June recorded 20 assists and Merin Merkle had 4 total blocks.
Set 1: Concordia 22, Lourdes 25
The Cardinals won the first point of the set by way of a Claudia Grepke kill, but the Gray Wolves responded with four straight points. The teams then began trading points with Lourdes maintaining a narrow advantage. That narrow lead grew to seven points for the Gray Wolves, but Concordia responded with eight out of nine points to tie the game back up. Lourdes then closed out the set with a run to win 25-22.
Set 2: Concordia 21, Lourdes 25
The second set was closely contested, with neither side able to get a lead bigger than three points at the start. Breann June, Claudia Grepke, Megan Neumann, and Jessalyn Peavyhouse all contributed kills as the Cardinals kept pace with Lourdes. The Gray Wolves were able to break away at the end of the set, taking advantage of Cardinal attacking errors.
Set 3: Concordia 28, Lourdes 26
The third set was also neck-and-neck the entire way, even going beyond 25 points for the Cardinals to win by two. Concordia benefited from a pair of blocks from Jessalyn Peavyhouse and Merin Merkle early on. It was then Breann June and Claudia Grepke powering the Cardinal offense with multiple kills each. Lourdes went on a small run to go up by three, but June stopped the run with a kill. After a Peavyhouse kill moments later, neither side was able to get a lead larger than one point. Back-to-back kills from June and Emma Leinberger sealed the deal, winning the third set for the Cardinals.
Set 4: Concordia 17, Lourdes 25
Lourdes jumped out to an early lead, but Merin Merkle and Megan Neumann recorded a couple of kills each to help the Cardinals claw their way back into set. The Gray Wolves began to pull away with a well-timed ace and attacking errors from Concordia. Concordia did their best to come back, but the Lourdes attackers found their stride down the stretch to ultimately secure the win for the Gray Wolves.
The Cardinals will now enter the postseason as the #9 seed in the WHAC and will face off against UM-Dearborn on Monday, November 11th in a play-in game at Dearborn.
