NORTH MANCHESTER, IND.-- The Trine volleyball team opened the season with a pair of wins at the HCAC/MIAA Crossover, held Friday afternoon in Stauffer-Wolfe Arena.
The Thunder opened their season with a 3-1 victory over Rose-Hulman. They followed by rallying back from dropping the first two sets to defeat Anderson 3-2 in their second match of the day. Taylor Rabel (Muncie, Ind./Muncie Central) notched 38 kills and added 12 digs between the two matches. Carly Searles (Levering, Mich./Petoskey) notched triple-doubles in each match. Trine opens the season 2-0 and will continue play at the HCAC/MIAA Crossover Challenge tomorrow.
Trine 3, Rose Hulman 1
Trine dropped the first set to the Fighting Engineers, 19-25, but rallied back to take the final three by scores of 25-23, 26-24 and 25-19.
Rabel carried the way offensively from the outside, putting away a career-high 23 kills on a .233 hitting percentage. Searles made an impact offensively with her passing and attacking abilities, passing out 40 assists and adding 14 kills. The senior also notched 18 digs.
Lauren Verkamp (Franklin, Ind./Franklin Community) and Megan Verkamp (Franklin, Ind./Franklin Community) each added seven kills for the Thunder. Freshman Mikayla Carpenter (Huntington, Ind./Huntington North) made an impact defensively in her first collegiate match with a team-high 18 digs.
Morgan Dreyer led the Rose-Hulman attack with 15 kills. She added 17 assists and seven digs. Sarah Jensen added 12 kills, 14 assists, and 16 digs.
Trine 3, Anderson 2
Anderson came out and took the first two sets, 25-21 and 25-23. However, the Thunder were able to dig deep to rally back and take the final three sets, 25-20, 25-22, 15-5.
Lauren Verkamp led the attack with 16 kills on a .306 hitting percentage. Searles made a big impact in the second match as well, filling the stat sheet with 13 kills, 40 assists and 21 digs. Rabel added 15 kills, while Carpenter notched 16 digs.
The Thunder outhit Anderson by a .214 to .130 margin overall. Trine came out firing on all cylinders offensively in the final set, hitting .353 to seal the victory.
Annie Bachman led Anderson with 13 kills, but was held to a -.058 hitting percentage. Melissa Baab added 10 kills for the Ravens.
Trine will face Franklin at 11 a.m. and Manchester at 3 p.m. to conclude the MIAA/HCAC Crossover tomorrow.