ANGOLA, Ind.-- Trine was unable to overcome a slow start, as the Thunder dropped the first two sets to Saint Mary's and was defeated by the Belles in four sets Friday night in Hershey Hall.
Saint Mary's picked up the victory by finals of 25-13, 25-22, 22-25, 25-20. The Belles came out firing on all cylinders, hitting .577 in the opening set to establish early control of the match. Alexis Grady led SMC with 15 kills and added 12 digs, while Katie Hecklinski added 14 kills and 11 digs. Trine was led by Lauren Verkamp's (Franklin, Ind./Franklin Community) 11 kills, while freshman Shannon Scott (Vicksburg, Mich./Vicksburg) added a career-high nine kills and hit .438. The Thunder fell to 2-4 overall, 1-1 in the MIAA. Saint Mary's is 5-2 overall and 1-1 in conference matches.
Trine setters Samantha Ihri (Kendallville, Ind./East Noble) and Emily Schaub (Ceresco, Mich./Battle Creek St. Philip) each passed out 17 assists, with Ihrie adding 10 digs. Mikayla Carpenter (Huntington, Ind./Huntington North) notched a match-high 19 digs for the Thunder.
Saint Mary's outhit Trine by a .228-to-.132 margin. The Belles notched 60 digs to 51 for the Thunder.
The first set was tight until midway through, when Saint Mary's blew open an 11-all tie to close the set with a 14-2 run. Included in that stretch were two six-point runs.
Trine outhit the Belles in the second set, but SMC got six kills from Grady that loomed large. The final of Grady's kills stopped a Thunder rally that had closed the deficit to two and have the Belles the winner in the set.
The Thunder played its best volleyball of the match in the third set as they held SMC to a .000 hitting percentage. A 10-2 run opened up a 13-6 lead, which never shrank less than three the rest of the set. Four of Scott's kills came in the third set.
A late, three-point Belles run helped close out the victory in the final set. A kill by Grady punctuated the run and gave SMC a 23-19 lead, which was too much for Trine to overcome.
The Thunder continue MIAA-play tomorrow with an 11 a.m. match at Kalamazoo.
