QUINCY, Ill. - After an uncharacteristic weekend featuring two losses last week, the Hawks righted the ship and remained perfect on the home hardwood in a four set victory over the Greyhounds of University of Indianapolis. With the (25-21, 20-25, 25-17, 25-19) four set win, head coach,
Mark Jones, eclipsed 100 career wins at the helm of the program in his fifth season.
Set One
UINDY built a small advantage at 7-4 before a five-point QU run put the Hawks in front 9-7. Shortly after the Greyhounds regained the lead 11-10, prompting Quincy to take five of the next six points and a 15-12 advantage. Three kills from
Luna Van Baars along with service aces from
Alice Pavan and
Brianna Merkel fueled the run.
Indianapolis responded with a three-point run to equalize the score at 15-15. The Hawks stayed on top until three straight points at 18-16 put UINDY ahead 19-18. Later in the set, trailing 20-19, Quincy took four in a row on kills from Van Bars, Merkel and an ace and kill from
Susanna Beretti to make it 23-20. Following a point from their opponent, the Hawks took the final two to seal a 25-21 victory.
Set Two
The Greyhounds came out firing in the second frame, jumping out to a 9-5 lead. QU found its way back into things soon after, taking five of six at 10-6 to knot it up 11-11.
Luna Van Baars collected three kills and a block along with a kill from Merkel to get the Hawks going.
At a later juncture, Indianapolis rebuilt its lead to four at 18-14, forcing a response from Quincy to the tune of six of the next eight points and a deadlock at 20-20 heading down the stretch. UINDY nabbed the final five points of the set for a 25-20 winner.
Set Three
Following a kill from the Greyhounds, it was the Hawks that got things cooking in the early going, taking advantage of errors, a block from
Erin Matzke, and kills from Beretti and
Emma Wijnbergen to lead it 6-3. QU pressed the lead further to five at 13-8, only to be met with a four-point run from Indianapolis, slicing the lead to 13-12.
The Hawks fended off the UINDY advance and rebuilt their lead to four at 18-14. It was all Quincy from there, collecting seven of the final 10 points of the set en route to a convincing 25-17 win and 2-1 lead in the match.
Set Four
A kill from Matzke and an ace from Merkel put the first two points of the fourth set on the board. The Greyhounds used an error and a block to even the score 2-2, before committing three straight errors to put QU ahead 5-2.
Indianapolis narrowed the margin and hung around, trailing 9-7, until the Hawks took five of the next seven and a 14-9 advantage. QU never looked back from there, not allowing its opponent to come any closer than four points for the remainder of the set. Up 23-19, a kill and a block from Pavan closed the book on a 25-19 set and 3-1 match victory for Quincy.
Next up for the Hawks is an afternoon showdown of nationally ranked squads with big conference implications, as the #13 Flyers of Lewis University come to town on Saturday (Nov. 11) for a 2:00 PM battle for second position in the GLVC standings in the final regular season match of the year.
